SMEs Put Faith In Outsourced Cybersecurity

The majority of small businesses are not only aware of cyberthreats to their businesses but actually expect to be hit with a cyberattack at some point.

A new report by Kaspersky Lab finds that, with so many small businesses understanding the threat of cyberattacks, yet with few resources to allocate towards cybersecurity, SMEs are beginning to turn to security outsourcing to safeguard their businesses.

“The report shows that SMBs currently face a number of challenges when it comes to protecting their businesses from security threats,” explained Kaspersky Head of SMB Marketing Vladimir Zapolyansky in a statement Thursday (Oct. 20). “On the one hand, they typically have a lack of resources, budgets and security expertise that can make them attractive to cybercriminals. On the other hand, increasingly complex security environments resulting from trends, such as the volume of mobile devices they need to protect, requires action.”

Data released by Kaspersky in its “The Evolving Role of SaaS and IT Outsourcing in SMB IT Security” report found that 54 percent of small businesses believe their business’ security will be compromised at least once. Even so, 40 percent admitted that they do not have adequate internal intelligence to face the threat of a cyberattack.

Nearly half pointed to a loss of internal and confidential data as a top cybersecurity concern. And with the increase in mobile devices and other technologies within the enterprise, most SMBs said trends like BYOD are making cybersecurity more difficult to get a handle on.

The majority of businesses also noted that they probably won’t be allocating more of their budget to hire internal IT and cybersecurity professionals.

According to Zapolyansky, small businesses should prioritize smart budget spending on their security efforts, and outsourcing cybersecurity services can be a cost-efficient way of protecting their businesses. “By taking a SaaS approach to security, SMBs can take advantage of endpoint security solutions without having the hefty budgets of enterprise counterparts.”