After a busy 2022, with a continued move towards more agile working, we're looking forward to the developments of the technology industry in 2023. Below are my predictions for technology trends in the coming year that could affect you and your business.

Small businesses will continue to focus on bolstering their cyber security measures to protect their teams in the office, on the move, and at home. 

Small businesses are being targeted by cyber criminals more than ever. It is important that companies educate and protect their business and the devices that are used, regardless of who owns them (yes, that means potentially installing work tools onto personal devices, which needs to be clearly communicated to employees to maintain a trusted environment). 

Recent years have seen a rise in Zero Trust policies in many companies, Zero Trust being a strategic approach that businesses can use to ensure devices continuously validate their connection to company networks regardless of location. With Zero Trust security becoming increasingly more viable and cost-effective as an option, it represents one of several emerging technology trends that will allow companies to protect employees in more ways than previously possible. As an example, companies that implement this technology can maintain the security of their internal system, even when users may be at home or roaming around at a Wi-Fi coffee shop.

Zero Trust has traditionally restricted access to company systems outside of authorised networks and physical locations. It is a good exercise to routinely review how and from where your business tools can be accessed from (e.g. behind a company firewall, your office, or via a Zero Trust solution).

We’ll see a growing level of attention and scrutiny placed on the IT security policies of your vendors.

Cyber criminals will further their efforts in targeting vendors and partners, including those that you may be currently relying on. 

Regulated firms (such as those of you in the financial services and wealth management space) need to be extra vigilant, and I strongly suggest clients request more visibility when it comes to understanding how their vendors are protecting their data. I have personally witnessed several instances of attackers sitting silently on a vendor’s computer system or the computer system of a partner, waiting patiently to attack. When that opportunity arises, they will not hesitate to change invoice details and banking information, priming themselves to steal your company data, your hard-earned money, or both.

I highly recommend engaging with your vendors to enforce processes for when invoices or banking details change, such as meeting in person to exchange new account information. In addition, it is crucial to ensure your team members that deal with financial information are vigilant to these types of attacks. 

Cyber Essentials will continue to garner attention in the UK markets.

Cyber Essentials, which is a UK-government based certification, will continue to grow in awareness in 2023. While there is a level of brand support behind the Cyber Essentials programme, such as through regulatory changes from the Financial Conduct Authority, this is one of the technology trends that we’re seeing as being mostly brought to users’ attention by technology companies directly, including BTRS.

This certificate follows a fundamental set of guidelines to help secure your business, your employees, and your clients. You may want to consider mandating your vendors hold a Cyber Essentials certification as a pre-requisite of working with you.

If you'd like to know more about Cyber Essentials specifically, we suggest you get in touch directly, as we'd be happy to delve further.

Employees will continue to be educated on cyber security trends and will be taught how to identify potential threats more accurately.

I predict that more than 50% of small to medium businesses this year in the UK will be compromised, despite nearly 60% of you proactively changing your cyber security infrastructure within the last 12 months. 

These are unprecedented times, and, unfortunately, 2022 saw 82% of successful malicious attacks coming from human interaction. Now, this is a reduction from the past where more than 90% of breaches came from human interaction, indicating that consistent training and awareness is working, however, there is still a long way to go. Phishing and credential swiping remain the most present of the attack vectors, so it's best to protect against those where possible. 

I highly recommend you check in with your IT team or partner and ask them what security policies are currently in place to reduce exposure of your team to these malicious attacks. In addition, it’s worth having a few ‘tech tips’ in your weekly or monthly sales meetings to reinforce the importance of users being aware of the dangers that exist online (and keep an eye out for my upcoming blog on this very topic in the next few weeks).

The increasing costs of infrastructure will cause price climbs in your subscriptions (and, in fact, they probably already are).

It's widely known that general costs are going up everywhere, and the evolving world of technology trends presents no exception.

The technology sector continues to be hit hard by rising energy and property costs, and with so many of our technological services relying on the ‘cloud' to operate as a business, the licensing and subscription costs are increasing. Microsoft, for example, has already announced its 2023 price increases of roughly 20%, which is one of its largest ever year-on-year increases to date.

In summary, my predictions for cybersecurity and technology trends for 2023 revolve around improving cyber security to protect all users at work and home, attention towards the IT security policies of vendors, and the government-backed Cyber Essentials Certification for meeting strict security requirements.

If you’d like to know how your company’s cyber security ranks against some of these current threats in the digital world, BTRS has created a Cyber Security Scorecard that can offer insights into the strengths and weaknesses of your network. The test is completely free, takes only a couple of minutes, and provides completely tailored results. Follow the link below for more information.

https://bit.ly/3zBOAdv