When it comes time to let an employee go, there are quite a few stresses that come into play. One of those can and should be the data in the business. Reality is there is no sure fire way to protect your data from malicious intent, but here are 3 steps you can take to limit the loss and ease of destruction.
1. Change your Passwords: Never use the same password across multiple accounts at the business. But do make use of a password logging tool. Companies like LastPass and others offer solutions that assist when you need to “change the locks” on your passwords. It can serve as a list of accounts and passwords that need changed (see item 3) and can also reduce production loss for the rest of the team. Be careful though to always use a very secure password for the master password that is at least 12 characters long, but preferably 20 or more.
2. Backup your data. Unfortunately it is not uncommon to see an employee maliciously destroy company data upon their dismal. The best and only way to protect against this is backing up your data to a cloud based environment. This limits physical destruction as well. If you didn’t already have enough reasons to backup your data, well there’s another one. Remember if this does ever happen to you, you can and should call the police to report the incident. It is illegal to delete files for malicious reasons.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1030
3. Have a dismissal guide. A dismissal guide is basically a reverse of the steps you take when bringing an employee on board. The easiest way to form one is to write it when you hire a new employee. As you provide access to different logins, softwares, VPNs, etc mark down these items and use it as a check list of things to “undo” in the event of letting an employee go. You certainly don’t want to forget to change a certain password or receive back a piece of technology with important data. Don’t forget to consider data that might be harmful in the hands of your competitors.
At Gamma Tech Services we seek to provide protection for our Managed Services clients when they lose an employee. If you let us know in advance, we can be sure to assist with these processes and ensure that your data is as protected as possible.