Published by Jessica Weisman-Pitts
Posted on August 2, 2021
10 min readLast updated: January 21, 2026
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By Dr. Michael Berger, President, DocuWare Group
With the vast majority of workers across all industries moving from the office to their homes, companies have had to adapt quickly and overcome a number of hurdles. While remote working has offered several benefits to many employees – great flexibility, better work-life balance to name only a few – this new environment does raise the issue of several potential security challenges for organisations.
Cybersecurity threats are evolving every day and with some form of working from home likely to continue as the world gets back on its feet, now more than ever business continuity is critical. To protect their workforce so that they can continue to work safely, anytime, and anywhere, businesses must arm themselves with best-in-class tools to fight back against cybercrime. This is especially important for finance teams, who must store, manage and process large volumes of confidential documents.
Identifying the risks
Cybercriminals are taking advantage of the COVID-19 pandemic and the increased remote workforce many organisations are now presented with. For example, employees are now finding themselves having to connect to an unsecured home or public Wi-Fi. Both seriously expose the user to malicious attacks. Offices typically provide more complex security measures and protocols to employees, such as firewalls and data protection tools.
Ransomware, a type of crypto-virus that encrypts a file and enables criminals to demand payment for decryption or unlocking, is also a major threat to remote working. Cybercriminals are increasingly sending ransomware into an organisation or user’s network. Criminals are no longer simply withholding data but are also threatening to leak it publicly unless the victim pays the ransom. Compromised information could range from data on the COVID-19 vaccine, medical equipment, and government economic assistance.
Cybercriminals are also exploiting the situation to scam people into sending private and sensitive information. Known as phishing attacks, they come in many forms, such as emails and text messages, that supposedly contain important news and encourage people to click on an attachment or link. Working in the same physical office means colleagues can talk about a suspicious incoming email. While working in siloes at home leaves employees more vulnerable and open to these types of attacks.
Selecting the right solution
To address these security risks, organisations can look to technology to help manage processes.
By investing in the right document management solution, organisations can digitally transform and securely store electronic files in an organised repository for quick retrieval. This enables businesses to ensure protection against both deliberate and accidental security breaches, manage access control, protection, and handle data mismanagement.
When it comes to financial services, restricting access to documents is critical. By ensuring that employees can only access documents with a unique username and password not only provides greater control but also transparency around which document was accessed, by whom, and what actions were taken. Additional security can be reached by using Single Sign-On authentication for employees. This tool enables users to securely access multiple applications and services using just one set of credentials. Organisations can also restrict access to a document based on that document’s index data. These are the key points of metadata used to describe a document’s content and purpose, and this means that only the right people have the correct level of access to different documents.
For financial service providers, it is particularly important to store documents in a legally compliant manner. In addition, these documents must be immediately retrievable, be it for a financial audit or an urgent credit request. By leveraging the rules outlined in regulations such as GDPR, and other compliance requirements, organisations can embrace these standards of control easily, whilst benefiting from data integrity, inherent productivity, and a better customer experience. In addition, businesses must also meet compliance standards by training employees regularly on how to handle sensitive information and deal with social hacking and engineering attacks so that networks and systems are protected, and a secure environment is maintained.
The future of the home office
Once the right security protocols and system protection measures have been put in place, organisations must also better inform employees on how to protect themselves at home. Training for employees is vital to ensure that human error is minimal. Employers need to ensure that their employees feel comfortable dealing with security risks at home, such as when to flag potentially harmful emails, and to whom they can escalate security matters.
Additionally, employees must also install safeguards, such as firewalls and anti-virus software at home (as described in their company’s policy). Crypto viruses can embed themselves in documents and attack when opened on a user’s local device. Installing the appropriate software and tools protects against most of these attacks and ensures that the user’s local environment is not threatened. A final important point to make is to ensure employees always use a Virtual Private Network (VPN). This means they can protect their privacy at home and on the road, as it creates a self-contained network used for encrypted or anonymous communication and data transmission via the internet.
Remain and maintain security
Today’s workforce looks different thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic. Companies moved from having to secure one physical office to having to suddenly protect a multitude of at-home ones instead. Providing a safe and secure environment for employees is a top priority for business leaders. Organisations that have invested or plan to invest and implement user-friendly document management solutions that flex with the needs of a department without adding work for the IT team are on the path to ensuring business continuity and security.
By Dr. Michael Berger, President, DocuWare Group
With the vast majority of workers across all industries moving from the office to their homes, companies have had to adapt quickly and overcome a number of hurdles. While remote working has offered several benefits to many employees – great flexibility, better work-life balance to name only a few – this new environment does raise the issue of several potential security challenges for organisations.
Cybersecurity threats are evolving every day and with some form of working from home likely to continue as the world gets back on its feet, now more than ever business continuity is critical. To protect their workforce so that they can continue to work safely, anytime, and anywhere, businesses must arm themselves with best-in-class tools to fight back against cybercrime. This is especially important for finance teams, who must store, manage and process large volumes of confidential documents.
Identifying the risks
Cybercriminals are taking advantage of the COVID-19 pandemic and the increased remote workforce many organisations are now presented with. For example, employees are now finding themselves having to connect to an unsecured home or public Wi-Fi. Both seriously expose the user to malicious attacks. Offices typically provide more complex security measures and protocols to employees, such as firewalls and data protection tools.
Ransomware, a type of crypto-virus that encrypts a file and enables criminals to demand payment for decryption or unlocking, is also a major threat to remote working. Cybercriminals are increasingly sending ransomware into an organisation or user’s network. Criminals are no longer simply withholding data but are also threatening to leak it publicly unless the victim pays the ransom. Compromised information could range from data on the COVID-19 vaccine, medical equipment, and government economic assistance.
Cybercriminals are also exploiting the situation to scam people into sending private and sensitive information. Known as phishing attacks, they come in many forms, such as emails and text messages, that supposedly contain important news and encourage people to click on an attachment or link. Working in the same physical office means colleagues can talk about a suspicious incoming email. While working in siloes at home leaves employees more vulnerable and open to these types of attacks.
Selecting the right solution
To address these security risks, organisations can look to technology to help manage processes.
By investing in the right document management solution, organisations can digitally transform and securely store electronic files in an organised repository for quick retrieval. This enables businesses to ensure protection against both deliberate and accidental security breaches, manage access control, protection, and handle data mismanagement.
When it comes to financial services, restricting access to documents is critical. By ensuring that employees can only access documents with a unique username and password not only provides greater control but also transparency around which document was accessed, by whom, and what actions were taken. Additional security can be reached by using Single Sign-On authentication for employees. This tool enables users to securely access multiple applications and services using just one set of credentials. Organisations can also restrict access to a document based on that document’s index data. These are the key points of metadata used to describe a document’s content and purpose, and this means that only the right people have the correct level of access to different documents.
For financial service providers, it is particularly important to store documents in a legally compliant manner. In addition, these documents must be immediately retrievable, be it for a financial audit or an urgent credit request. By leveraging the rules outlined in regulations such as GDPR, and other compliance requirements, organisations can embrace these standards of control easily, whilst benefiting from data integrity, inherent productivity, and a better customer experience. In addition, businesses must also meet compliance standards by training employees regularly on how to handle sensitive information and deal with social hacking and engineering attacks so that networks and systems are protected, and a secure environment is maintained.
The future of the home office
Once the right security protocols and system protection measures have been put in place, organisations must also better inform employees on how to protect themselves at home. Training for employees is vital to ensure that human error is minimal. Employers need to ensure that their employees feel comfortable dealing with security risks at home, such as when to flag potentially harmful emails, and to whom they can escalate security matters.
Additionally, employees must also install safeguards, such as firewalls and anti-virus software at home (as described in their company’s policy). Crypto viruses can embed themselves in documents and attack when opened on a user’s local device. Installing the appropriate software and tools protects against most of these attacks and ensures that the user’s local environment is not threatened. A final important point to make is to ensure employees always use a Virtual Private Network (VPN). This means they can protect their privacy at home and on the road, as it creates a self-contained network used for encrypted or anonymous communication and data transmission via the internet.
Remain and maintain security
Today’s workforce looks different thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic. Companies moved from having to secure one physical office to having to suddenly protect a multitude of at-home ones instead. Providing a safe and secure environment for employees is a top priority for business leaders. Organisations that have invested or plan to invest and implement user-friendly document management solutions that flex with the needs of a department without adding work for the IT team are on the path to ensuring business continuity and security.
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