I have worked at home for part of each week for over ten years. I have never had any guidance from my employer on security practices, mandates or recommendations (less the case where I am the employer or part-owner). I think I do a pretty decent jobs at securing my home and mobile computing environment.
I was interested in how I fared after reading a recent article entitled Seven Deadly Sins of Home Office Security. Let’s consider them:
Probably my biggest mistake, according to this list, is separating my business from non-business activities as it relates to my computer. For me, who works in a small business environment, my business is very much part of my life and working at home is what I do.
If I want to watch a Netflix streaming video on my computer, I will do so without hesitation.
I back-up regularly but probably not regular enough. I am thinking strongly about a remote backup system to bolster my business continuity posture.
This list is a good checklist. But the better solution is for the management team to insist upon a prudent yet reasonable approach to remote and home computing with clear policies backed by consistent audits and enforcement.
18 August 2009 at 18:06
I think that anyone who is working at home as a self employed professional will run into several problems with this list. Keeping your business separate from your home being among the top in my opinion. Unless your set aside an office with a septet computer from you personal computer with only the software you would need to do business, I would not be able to keep it set apart. Even then Like you said, I would just say to myself “who cares!” and just watch my funny youtube vids. Besides that I don’t think I do a bad job setting up the basic security for the router, firewall, as well as the Wi-Fi. Backing up the data and keeping it separate from the computer or in a secure location would be a problem unless you have a safe to lock it up in or have an online backup.