Don’t Let Your Business Fall Victim to These Crimes!
Crime Scene – Do Not Cross
You should never underestimate the manifold ways in which crime can affect your business in a big way. It’s not just the immediate equipment losses and financial hits you have to concern yourself with. You also need to consider this from the point of view of your employees and your customers.
Falling victim to a crime can actually result in employees and customers losing faith in you. Employees will wonder if they’re actually safe at this job. Customers may wonder if their money and personal information are safe with you! The sort of crimes your business could be hit with could result in a lot of lost productivity and a mountain of legal issues, especially if there’s undetected fraud going on.
Here are the top three crime areas that every business should be concerning themselves with.
Trespassing
When people talk about the sort of crimes that can happen to your business, this is usually the first thing they’ll think of. This is fairly generic non-employee crime, as some people know it. It’s the primary crime concern of the vast majority of businesses, and rightly so: it’s still the most common crime committed against them.
For businesses that have customers on-site, such as stores and restaurants, the threat is almost constant. It’s vital that you have a strong CCTV system set up. You should also ensure that people know that you have CCTV that is carefully monitored. On-site security guards must also be around to prevent this.
For other businesses that have offices locked from the public, it may seem that there’s not much reason to worry. And, sure, theft is certainly a lot less likely to occur to such a business. But breaking and entering is still very much possible if you don’t have a security system in place. But not all trespassing comes in this form. Many businesses fall victim to someone simply walking into the office, with no-one questioning their presence (assuming that they’re accounted for by another employee). This leaves the business vulnerable to many data risks that can lead to information leaks and even fraud. Again, a mountain of legal problems could affect you if this happens!
Cybercrime
Your business probably uses computers that are hooked up to the Internet. And guess what? That means you’re always a potential target for cybercriminals! This isn’t something you should just shrug off. You may not think a small business such as yours would fall victim to cybercrime. But the kind of records and customer data that even a small business keeps will mean that cybercriminals aren’t always looking to target bigger companies.
A lot of cases of fraud occur due to cybercrime. When a cybercriminal hacks into a small business’s network, they may get access to the credit information of all your customers, as well as the personal information of you and your employees. If they so choose, they could also infect your network with viruses.
The possibility of fraud, particularly credit card fraud and identity theft, should worry you. Thankfully, there are plenty of things you can do to help prevent this. In the specific case of identity fraud, there are preventative services out there that can help you. If you don’t know which one to sign up with, take a look at these reviews. Of course, you’ll also have to look into the usual methods of online protection: strong WiFi passwords, anti-viruses software, firewalls, a protect backup copies of all your data.
Employee crime
Leaves a pretty bad taste in the mouth, doesn’t it? Employee crime. Is it less desirable than any other crime? Perhaps. For one, it damages your sense of trust in a way that the other forms of crime don’t. It also means that, along with the immediate effect of the crime committed against you, you’ll also probably lose the employee! And employees, after all, are at once your most expensive and valuable asset.
Unfortunately, you do have to have measures in place to prevent employee crime from occurring. While we don’t want to make you paranoid, it’s simply a fact that employees are always in the best position to commit a crime against your business! Businesses have sometimes found themselves being embezzled by their employees for several years before they realize what’s going on.
The ways to prevent employee crime begin at the recruitment stage. You should ensure you’re doing your best to hire trustworthy people. You should consider running criminal background checks on employees. Making sure there’s CCTV in locations where only staff can go is a must. Many business owners make the mistake of only placing such security measures in areas where customers are allowed.