When offices close and services stall, no one monitors the growing threats. This is exactly when you need your cybersecurity running at full strength. With staff shortages, fewer people are watching for attackers. Phishing, ransomware attempts, and credential-stealing tactics continue to hit small and medium-sized businesses, especially those without security teams on-site.
Right now, every company should be reviewing how well employees are trained and whether they understand the procedures that protect the business. A recent Google article highlights several active threats: online job scams, negative review extortion, AI product impersonation, malicious VPN apps and extensions, fraud recovery scams, and seasonal holiday scams. These attacks can cause major disruptions that take days, sometimes weeks, to recover from.
As the government reopens, prepare for a backlog of undetected threats. Some systems haven’t been powered on for weeks, meaning little to no monitoring has occurred. Updates and patches are overdue. This catch-up phase creates chaos and opens the door for convincing phishing “reactivation” emails.
The bottom line: the shutdown weakens monitoring, and reopening adds new vulnerabilities. If you’re unsure whether this is affecting your business, give us a call we are here to help with your IT security today.
