What Is Cyber Essentials And Why Do You Need It?

Published on 30 April 2021

Protecting your business from cyber-attacks has become increasingly more important over the last year. Before the pandemic hit, businesses only needed to focus their cyber-security on their internal networks and devices. However, with the increase of employees working from home, businesses need to ensure that each end user’s device is safe and secure.

Cyber Essentials is a government backed, industry supported scheme, developed and managed by the National Cyber Security Centre. It provides instructions and guidance on how to protect businesses against the most common cyber threats. Cyber Essentials is designed to advise you on how to prevent these attacks and better protect your business’s network. It aims to give flexible, concise, easy to follow advice on protecting against common cyber-attacks, no matter the size of your business or the level of cyber-security knowledge. Working with the IASME Consortium, The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) is constantly evolving to keep up with the changing environment within the cyber world; ensuring that your business has the most up to date information about cyber-security threats.

Types Of Cyber Essentials

There are two types of Cyber Essentials Certifications available to businesses: Cyber Essentials and Cyber Essentials Plus. The first, Cyber Essentials, is carried out by self-assessment. It provides your business with guidance to follow and implement so your business is protected from 80% of the most common cyber-attacks. It will cover firewalls, patch management, access control, malware protection and secure configuration. With Cyber Essentials Plus, an auditor will come to your business and verify your self-assessment audit. Bluebell IT Solutions can assist you in this process by auditing your IT environment and make suggestions and improvements, so you can be confident that you will successfully pass. With both Cyber Essentials and Cyber Essentials Plus your business will receive a certification, marketing material to put on your company’s website and emails, and most importantly you can have peace of mind that your business is cyber secure. By not having Cyber Essentials, you mark your business’s network as vulnerable, therefore you are more likely to become the target of malicious attacks.

Benefits Of Being Cyber Essentials Certified 

There are many benefits for your business to have a Cyber Essentials certification. By having and displaying your certification you let potential clients and prospect businesses know that you take cyber security seriously, increasing your trustworthiness. As well reassuring your already existing customer base that their data security is safe and important to you.  Many government contracts require you to have a Cyber Essentials certification. By doing the self-assessment you will get a clear picture of your business’s cyber security level, and instructions on what changes to make to strengthen it. You will avoid the negative outcomes of cyber-attacks like phishing, malware, ransomware, password guessing and network attacks.

According to Cisco’s “2021 Security Outcomes for SMBs Study” many small to medium businesses are leading the way for cyber security. However, it is important to remember that while your business may have excellent cyber security practices some of the larger companies you interact with may not. Which is why having a Cyber Essentials certificate, will give you peace of mind knowing that your business is protected, and you have measures in place to ensure your business and your clients are safe from cyber-attacks. 

By doing the Cyber Essentials or the Cyber Essentials Plus assessment you are ensuring that your business is safe and secure from 80% of common cyber-attacks. You will receive guidance and instructions on how to manage an attack if it happens. You will save money in the long term by preventing the cyber-attacks before they happen, rather than afterwards. Most importantly you have taken steps to prevent cyber-attacks by gaining a Cyber Essentials certification.

If you would like to find out more information about Cyber Essentials or are looking to get Cyber Essentials certified, get in contact with us today and we can support you on your journey of becoming fully Cyber Essentials certified. Contact us today on 01908 044202. Alternatively, you can visit our contact page and send a message.