Offshoring is a rapidly growing industry, known for producing significant savings on labor without sacrificing quality of work. More than 80% of Fortune 500 companies offshore to locations like the Philippines to save up to 70% on their labor costs. It’s projected that the size of the global offshore outsourcing industry will reach $409.7 billion by 2027.
However, by virtue of being overseas, offshoring presents unique data privacy and safety challenges. For starters, there’s all the digital correspondence required, often entailing exchanges of sensitive data about things like trade secrets and proprietary technology. Information sent digitally carries risks of data breaches and privacy vulnerabilities.
Therefore, digital safety needs to be a priority for offshoring companies to maintain the integrity of business systems and information.
How to Secure Business Information When Offshoring
Although digital safety may seem intimidating at first, proactive security methods can give you the protection you need against cyber threats. We recommend starting off with these five tips:
1. Use VPNs
Each device has a unique IP address consisting of a string of characters that allow computers to locate where to send or receive the data when you’re using the internet. Sometimes, hackers take advantage of IP addresses for nefarious purposes.
Suppose you’re offshoring virtual assistants in the Philippines to manage your emails and appointments, and you give them login credentials for the tools you’re using. Without proper security protocols, a bad actor can easily find the virtual assistant’s IP address and use it to launch a phishing attack to access your sensitive information.
A phishing attack is a type of scheme where a person impersonates your trusted service provider and sends your virtual assistant an email containing attachments to plant malware in their device. If they infiltrate your system, their actions could result in stolen data, reputational damage, and even financial losses.
Fortunately, a VPN can minimize this risk by creating a secure connection between a user’s device and a remote VPN server. The VPN does this by encrypting the user’s data and masking their IP address, allowing the internet to be accessed privately and securely. This in turn protects personal information from being seen by third parties.
2. Use Secure Communication Tools
Negligence and lack of awareness of digital safety, especially in your communications, leaves one vulnerable to cyber schemes. Applications like Facebook Messenger may be tempting to use for speedy correspondence, but they lack the security needed to protect business data, increasing the chances of accidental information leaks.
As an alternative, consider encrypted video conferencing and messaging apps like Signal, an end-to-end encrypted messaging service, for stronger security. Some of its features include:
● Disappearing messages
● View-once media
● Hiding your phone number
Investing in secure communication tools helps protect sensitive information by encrypting messages so that only the intended recipients can read them. This is critical if your business handles private user data, financial records, intellectual property, or other confidential information.
Moreover, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) suggests changing the default password into a complex one. Enabling security and encryption settings on apps also adds a layer of protection for users.
When hosting video conferences, it is advisable to include a password or code to the meeting channel. This adds another element of security to mitigate potential exposure of sensitive company data or files. Enabling control access like the “waiting room” feature is also recommended as it allows meeting admins to vet users before letting them join the call.
3. Monitor and Audit
As the owner, you have full control over your business. If you have to hire someone to help when things become too busy, it can be difficult to adjust by giving up some of that control. The good news is you don’t have to give up all the reins when working with offshoring companies in the Philippines; you can just give them access to the aspects of your business that are within the scope of their job.
This is possible through monitoring systems that enable admins to assign and oversee data access and usage. Data access control is typically divided into four levels:
1. Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) – allows limiting of access to company information based on an employee’s position.
2. Discretionary Access Control (DAC) – offers a more collaborative environment than RBAC by restricting access to documents and granting certain privileges, such as editing permission. It’s the most flexible access control option among the four, but it creates a digital safety risk where users who lack security awareness may unintentionally share sensitive information with unauthorized people.
3. Mandatory Access Control (MAC) – relies on a strict hierarchy where it classifies resources and only provides each user with specific security clearances. However, it has the disadvantage of potentially delaying urgent requests for an employee’s temporary access to a document.
4. Attribute-Based Access Control (ABAC) determines a user’s access based on attributes, resources, and environments like access timestamps. Even though this gives you the most control in overseeing data usage and access, it can be confusing and complex to handle because of the number of elements involved.
4. Regularly Back Up Your Data
A study by Code42 found that data loss due to insider incidents cost businesses about $15 million on average, making regular data backups essential in protecting assets when offshoring in the Philippines.
Before backing up your data, make sure that you identify which data is important. Not only does this help you clear out space for critical data, but it also helps you streamline the process by prioritizing.
Next, choose which backup methods are suitable for your business. Most people prefer storing backups in cloud-based services like Amazon S3 because of its advanced security features.
Finally, confirm that your backups are working by checking for errors when opening the files from the backup. It also helps if you format the backup data files identically to the original copies to avoid confusion.
5. Train Your Team
One of the most effective security measures is having an educated in-house team and offshore staff that employs cyber security best practices and is aware of the latest cyber threats.
Allocate a portion of your business resources for employee training materials. You might have to hire an expert at this point to identify what cyber security concepts these materials should cover, such as:
● Phishing awareness
● Password Security
● Data protection
● Social engineering
Be sure also to consider the delivery format of the materials. You can choose from interactive modules, which allow you to include videos, quizzes, gamified elements, or case studies that dive into real-life scenarios.
Most of all, be inclusive. Create training materials in your employee’s native language to make it easier for them to understand the concepts and retain the information.
Protect Your Business by Offshoring with EVES
It may sound worrying to send business processes overseas to people you barely know and have that further exacerbated with the threat of cyberattacks. With the right cyber precautions in place however, you can maintain control without sacrificing your business data’s security.
Elite Virtual Employment Solutions (EVES) can facilitate the secure offshoring of your operations in the Philippines. We can assist with the onboarding of Filipino offshore staff into your information system in a way that maintains digital safety and privacy on their end. With the right guidance and technical support from a trusted partner, you can maximize the benefits of Philippine offshoring.
Email us at info@evesolutions.net or call our experts today at (747) 300-3234 for inquiries.
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