A crisis is not the time to discover that your backup and recovery solutions do not work.

The current climate of COVID-19 leaves many credit unions vulnerable to fraudsters stealing personal information, money, transaction records and other valuable data. Recently, the FBI reported that there is an increase in business email compromise (BEC) scams that targets anyone who performs legitimate fund transfers. BEC frauds are targeting municipalities that are purchasing supplies and personal protective equipment needed during the pandemic.

Hackers and bad actors are preying on consumers as online buying and digital payments increases during this time of social distancing. Additionally, staff shortages, teleworking and unavailable workers makes it harder to sustain business operations. Any loss or data theft can jeopardize the reputation of your financial institution, damage relationships with members and put your business at risk. Credit unions must be prepared for any illicit financial activity that occurs, similar to other disaster recovery protocols.

To protect your business before disaster strikes, ensure there is a reliable recovery process in place. Here’s where to start:

• Identify gaps in security. Test data before disaster strikes to provide recovery assurance and identify where there are areas of vulnerability. Tape backups are fragile and subject to damage, theft and destruction. Plus, they involve multi-step procedures that are susceptible to human errors. With more employees working remotely due to social distancing, can you rely on a system that requires scheduling jobs and transporting tapes between multiple locations? 
• Provide secure remote and branch office solutions. Having multiple remote office and branch office (ROBO) sites pose challenges when it comes to data protection. There are employees that are reliant upon remote access to do their jobs and need their own data backup. There may also be an increase in the number of cyber attacks on computers, equipment and unprotected networks as employees work from home. Ensuring resources are available and secure through virtual desktops is also key to having a productive workforce without sacrificing security and control.
• Maintain continuous protection. Using multiple hardware and software components for backup solutions can bog down efficiency. Tapes fail and it’s an inconvenience to drive to the credit union to replace them. Simplify backup and recovery with hybrid cloud environments that lets you manage all your data through one responsive interface. Not only can you recover files in the cloud with a few clicks, you can also manage the frequency and duration of backups. Your credit union will spend less time manually configuring jobs with an automated system.

Now that credit unions are transitioning to conducting more business through virtual means, it’s important you’re using the best systems for backup and disaster recovery. Fraudsters will make every attempt to steal valuable information so your data must be secure, accessible and backed up regularly.

One of the best decisions you can make is to work with Integrated Management Solutions who understands the value of your data. Let’s talk about the right solutions for your credit union.