In light of a recent document leak at a Massachusetts National Guard facility, it seems like a good time to talk about protecting businesses from data leaks and data fraud. These are running rampant through businesses. With sophisticated techniques and intelligent hackers, businesses are at risk without protective measures.

After all, if a National Guardsman stole and distributed classified National Defense information, it proves that data breaches can happen anywhere. On April 13, Jack Teixera, a National Guardsman was charged with removing or transmitting national defense information, a crime under the Espionage Act. The data included highly classified military documents about the Ukraine war and other national security issues.

Of course, steps should have been taken to prevent this breach. If you have sensitive data, you MUST implement certain protocols and monitor even trusted employees. Reasons for data theft and fraud include selling of data or access to it; working for a competitor or hacking group; employees disgruntled with their job or angry after firing.

Statistics on Employee Data Fraud and Theft

Before we discuss preventative measures, let’s look at some statistics:

• Employee theft and fraud is estimated to cost U.S. businesses up to $50 billion a year. (Source: Embroker, an insurance company)

• 66% of organizations consider malicious or (accidental) breaches more likely than external ones—an increase of 47% over the last two years. (Source: techjury) • The top three sectors for insider attacks are finance, insurance, and healthcare. (Source: Carnegie)

• 27% of employee fraud occurs in government, healthcare, construction, and service industries; 23% in finance, technology, and other. (Source: Ernst & Young)

• Employee theft causes more than 30% of business bankruptcy. (Source: Service Management Group)

What Preventative Measures Can Be Taken?

Let’s look at two: Security Protocols and Employee Background Screening.

SECURITY PROTOCOLS

According to Lepide, a data security firm, five protocols should be followed:

1) Know what data you have, its location, and why you’re keeping it—then classify it.

2) Using the Principle of Least Privilege, restrict access to critical data to limit damage by internal/external entities and to make it easier to ID the cause of any incident.

3) Exclude most employees from Admin, preventing malware installation or data downloads onto portable storage devices; block websites with online screen recording.

4)  Recognize red flags suggesting data theft, e.g., copying/moving/deleting files at unusual rates; uploading/downloading files to/from the corporate network at unusual rates; employee use of Private Browsing mode and/or The Onion Router (Tor); accessing of unusual IP addresses/ports; and emails going to personal email accounts.

5) When employees leave the company, voluntarily or not, the following should be done: – All user accounts should be disabled. – VPN and Remote Desktop access should be terminated. – Passwords should be changed on all shared accounts the user had access to. – Remove user from email group, distribution, and internal phone lists, and websites. – All company-owned physical assets (laptops, phones, tablets, etc.) that were assigned to the user should be retrieved or disabled, and the IT inventory should be updated. – Needed data from employee’s computer should be copied to the manager’s computer. – All access codes and PINs known to the user should be changed. – Inform company staff that the user is no longer employed by the company.

And probably most important in this section is number 6.

6) Implement software to monitor/prevent access, software that gives real-time visibility of who is accessing what critical data and when. These types of software allow real-time detection/response to events that match a pre-defined condition, e.g., a custom script could be executed to disable the relevant user account until the incident is investigated.

EMPLOYEE BACKGROUND SCREENING

We recommend a thorough employee background screening that includes:

• Misdemeanor and felony criminal records searches at the county, state, and national levels (international also, if necessary)

• Social Security number traces and validations

• Checks on references, credit, civil records, driver’s license, and motor vehicle records

• Military records verifications • Employment and education verifications

• Professional license verifications • Workers’ compensation history searches • Healthcare sanction checks

• Address history checks • Sex-offender status searches

• Social media screening

We recommend this background check before employees are hired, and periodically for existing employees, to identify changes in criminal or other status since their hire.

Why Choose The Hire Authority for Your
Employee Background Screening?

It’s important to hire an experienced and professional firm like The Hire Authority to do thorough screening. Hiring wrong employees can cost you a lot of money in the form of assaults, theft, fraud, accidents, low productivity, reputation damage, and even lawsuits.

The Hire Authority is also expert in complex compliance issues regarding state, federal, and county laws. These are constantly being updated and are difficult for employers to keep up with. Failure to comply can cost you big in regarding fines and even shutdown.

We hope this blog is helpful in protecting your business by providing the first steps in preventing employee data fraud and theft. So be safe, not sorry!

We’d be happy to talk to you about screening your employees.
Call us at (508) 230-5901 or visit our website www.hireauth.com.

 

The foregoing should not be construed as legal advice. Employers should always consult their own legal counsel for advice on labor and employment matters.