News

September 14, 2012

Two-thirds of small business websites are vulnerable to hackers

A survey conducted by UK web hosting company Heart Internet has revealed that two in three small business websites in the UK are vulnerable to attacks from hackers. The online survey polled 220 UK small businesses.

The research found that just 33% of small firms are using anti-hacker software on their websites. In addition, only 36% of the survey said they had anti-phishing software installed and 14% admitted to having no security measures for their website whatsoever.

The Financial Times recently reported that the UK is the world leader in e-commerce, predicting that the sector will contribute £225 billion to GDP by the year 2016. In addition, the number of small businesses that use the internet for sales and marketing is growing by 12% per year.

A survey conducted by Ponemon Research revealed that 90% of businesses said they have been hacked, indicating the extent of hacker activity. Common methods of infiltrating sites include SQL injections which can result in confidential information being stolen for fraudulent activities, and cross-site scripting which can result in visitor redirects, stolen account details and the spread of viruses.

Anti-virus software and firewalls were the most popular security measures amongst small businesses in the survey. Steps such as installing regular software updates, employing strong and secure passwords, email previewing windows, regular website back-ups and effective anti-hacker software are all proven methods of defending a website against hack attacks.

"It's extremely important for small businesses to protect themselves from malicious attacks to their website," said Heart Internet director Jonathan Brealey. "Repairing damaged sites proves costly both financially and from a PR perspective as you may find you have to win back the trust of your customer base if you have been hacked."