The Brief Guide That Makes Conducting an IT Audit Simple

Did you know that 97.2% of organizations are investing in big data and AI? Small and large businesses alike are following big data trends that require an improvement in their IT department.

Just last year, every person generated 1.7 megabytes per second which leads to the need to protect customer data as well. To ensure your IT equipment is up to the latest standards, you need to perform IT audits regularly.

Keep reading to learn how to conduct an IT audit.

Define the Scope of the Audit

The first step of conducting an IT audit is to define its scope. There are two types of audits that businesses tend to gravitate towards. The first is a generalized audit while the second is a more specific audit.

If you are conducting a specific IT audit, draw an imaginary perimeter around what needs to be audited. If you don’t know where the boundaries lie, start with the most valuable company assets and work down from there.

Outline Risks

A small business owner then needs to outline any risks that business data faces. Some of the most common business ownership IT department risks include:

• Malware/ransomware
• External hacking
• Denial of Service (DoS)
• Natural disasters
• Physical breaches
• Malicious misuse
• Phishing

Whether you’ve experienced any of these breaches or not, they are all possible risks that businesses might face.

Consider Current Security Measures

Once you consider all of the risks, you must figure out how your security measures can improve your situation. It might also be necessary to implement new controls during the business audit to reduce risks.

For example, you can consider implementing enterprise servers for increased security especially when it comes to a Denial of Service (DoS) attack.

Some of the must-have security measures for businesses include the following:

• Antivirus and firewall software
• Anti-spam filter
• Regular data backup
• Physical server security
• Multi-factor authentication
• User privilege

You can boost these security measures or add them to your IT plan if you don’t already use them. When you plan an audit around risk assessments, your audit will affect business operations for the better.

Keep Testing the Audit Process

Anyone in the IT industry will tell you that the audit process comes with trial and error. The audit process should collect data to alert you of potential system weaknesses.

Review your business policies and continue to monitor the process and procedures. All employees should be aligned in their roles and know how they affect the security process.

Once the systems are checked, identify the deficiencies and work out how to strengthen them. This final step is the key to an effective IT audit.

Finalizing Your IT Audit Process

To have an effective IT audit process you need to consider current and old hardware. All IT equipment needs to be audited with the above steps.

The threat of a cyber attack is real for any business no matter what size. When a cybercriminal steals your data, your business risks losing customers, going out of business, and legal problems.

If you don’t have a current IT audit plan, start creating one now! Don’t forget to keep coming back for more articles like this.