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Cyberattacks are among the critical issues all businesses could face today. If a company faces cyberattacks like a data breach, it will also likely suffer from several consequences, including reputational damage, loss of sensitive personal data, and financial loss. Hence, businesses must adhere to regulatory compliance to ensure cybersecurity and avoid the damage caused by cyberattacks. 

Fortunately, business people today can refer to a helpful site to check out some guidelines to protect their businesses against cyberattacks and ensure they are cybersecurity compliant. Cybersecurity compliance is a business risk assessment method based on security standards and regulations that help ensure a company’s IT infrastructure is secure against potential cyberattacks and existing vulnerabilities. Some cybersecurity compliance regulations include Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI-DSS), General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), and ISO/IEC 27001. 

Accordingly, read the critical points below to dig deeper into why your small business should be cybersecurity compliant in 2022: 

1. Avoid Fines And Penalties

Governments worldwide are increasingly imposing rules and regulations that protect the privacy and security of customer data collected by businesses. Not abiding by these rules and regulations applicable to their industries could lead to hefty fines and penalties. Notably, violating HIPAA rules and regulations can cost around USD$50,000 per valuation, with a maximum penalty of USD$1.5 million a year. Besides, severe HIPAA violations could lead to criminal charges and jail time. 

Regarding GDPR, it states that less severe violations could lead to a fine of up to EUR€10 million, or 2% of a company’s global annual turnover from the previous financial year, whichever of them is higher. Moreover, severe infringements could lead to a fine of around EUR€20 million or equaling 4% of a company’s worldwide annual revenue, whichever is higher.  

With that in mind, small businesses should ensure they meet cybersecurity laws and regulations to avoid costly non-compliance fines and penalties. 

2. Maintain Business Reputation

Maintaining a good business reputation is critical to the growth of any company. Businesses with a positive reputation can attract new customers and increase their perceived value to customers. Additionally, building and maintaining customer trust is an excellent way to maintain a positive business reputation. In particular, business downtime caused by cyberattacks and data breaches can damage a company’s reputation as customers don’t want to experience such issues. Yet the good thing is that you can protect your business by investing in cybersecurity and keeping up with cybersecurity regulatory compliance.  

Because customers today expect companies to keep their sensitive data like credit card details secure, complying with the latest cybersecurity rules and regulations imposed by the government and industry-standard organizations helps you build customer trust. 

3. Improve Data Management

Most companies today know the value of business data. Notably, they depend on reports generated by the reporting software they utilize for their day-to-day operations. However, there’s always a time when they need to gather data in one central location. This is where the role of data management comes in. Data management includes collecting, storing, accessing, and securing data from various software platforms. Accordingly, one of the best data management practices businesses can implement today is establishing a data compliance plan, including those with current cybersecurity laws and regulations. 

By creating a better framework to access a significant amount of business data, companies can make informed decisions and deliver products and services to their customers. Likewise, with improved data management, businesses can efficiently access data analytics that provides valuable insights to improve their operations.  

4. Gain A Competitive Edge

Certain business aspects that serve as a competitive edge help a company stand out from other competitors. In particular, a competitive advantage allows businesses to build and improve brand loyalty, attract potential investors, and get new customers. With the growing number of cyberattacks and data breaches that target businesses, you can stay ahead of the competition by taking proactive security measures and compliance to protect your business’s reputation. Being cybersecurity-compliant can avoid costly penalties, protect your business data, and help you build business credibility. Above all, you can ensure you stay in business and won’t suffer detrimental consequences caused by cyberattacks by complying with security laws and regulations. 

5. For Better Security

Security controls are countermeasures that protect data and IT infrastructure essential to a business. These security controls can be firewalls and administrative-related countermeasures like a company policy. Cybersecurity standards like GDPR, PCI-DSS, and HIPAA require that businesses have security controls for various information systems. With security controls, you can prevent cybercriminals from stealing critical information from your company. By being cybersecurity compliant, you can also quickly recover from a cyberattack and return to your daily business operations with less effort. 

Conclusion

Cybersecurity compliance is essential nowadays as cyberattacks like data breaches are rampant and can negatively impact companies. It’s also worth noting that cybersecurity compliance isn’t just strict and mandatory requirements imposed by regulatory bodies; it’s critical to a company’s overall success. Therefore, small businesses should invest in cybersecurity and ensure they meet current regulatory standards and requirements.