Cybersecurity
October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month
October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month, a good time to confirm the basics are in place across your business. Here are the foundational practices every organization should check, from phishing-resistant MFA to tested, immutable backups.
Every October, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and its partners run Cybersecurity Awareness Month. The 2026 theme is "Securing the Next 250." The campaign focuses on four everyday behaviors: recognize and report phishing, use strong passwords, turn on multi-factor authentication and use a password manager, and keep software updated. For a business, the month is a useful prompt to check whether those basics are actually in place across the whole organization.
No business is too small to be a target. Verizon's 2026 Data Breach Investigations Report found that 48% of all breaches now involve ransomware, and that 31% start with an exploited software vulnerability, which has overtaken stolen passwords as the most common way in. Smaller organizations are hit hard because they often have fewer people watching for trouble. The goal is not to make an attack impossible. It is to make your business a harder target and to recover quickly if something gets through.
Here are the foundational practices every organization should confirm this month.
Train Your Employees. Phishing and social engineering remain a leading cause of breaches, and AI has made scam messages far more convincing. Run short, regular training and phishing simulations, and make it easy and blame-free to report a suspicious message. Teach staff to verify any request for money, credentials, or data changes through a second channel, such as a call to a known number.
Use Multi-Factor Authentication Everywhere. Multi-factor authentication makes a stolen password far less useful to an attacker. Enable it on email, Microsoft 365, remote access, banking, and every administrator account. Where you can, use phishing-resistant methods such as passkeys or FIDO2 security keys, because codes and push approvals can still be captured by a fake sign-in page.
Use a Business Password Manager. Long, unique passwords for every account are only practical with a password manager. Current NIST guidance favors long passphrases and blocking known compromised passwords over complexity rules and forced periodic changes. Read more in our guide to how password managers protect your accounts.
Keep Systems Updated. With exploited vulnerabilities now the top way in, patching is not optional. Keep operating systems, browsers, applications, firewalls, and VPN appliances updated, and fix known exploited vulnerabilities within days. Replace devices and software that no longer receive security updates, including any remaining Windows 10 PCs not covered by Extended Security Updates.
Secure Your Network. Protect business Wi-Fi with strong encryption and a non-default administrator password, and keep guests and personal devices on a separate network. Run endpoint detection and response on every computer and server.
Back Up Your Data, and Test It. A tested backup is your safety net against ransomware. Keep at least one copy offsite and immutable or offline, so attackers who reach your network cannot delete or encrypt it, and restore from it periodically to prove it works.
Have a Response Plan. Knowing what to do after an incident is as important as preventing one. A basic incident response plan names who makes decisions, who calls your cyber insurer and legal counsel, how to contain the problem, and how to restore operations. Walk through it once a year as a tabletop exercise.
Let Cyber One Solutions Help Protect Your Business.
If you are not sure where your organization stands on any of these areas, Cyber One Solutions can help businesses in Texas and Tennessee find the gaps and close them. Learn about our managed cybersecurity services or contact us to schedule a cybersecurity assessment.