Consider this: Data from 2014 shows that, for the average business experiencing a data leakage of security breach, the cost per stolen record is $145. For small businesses, just a few stolen pieces of data can become a major financial complication — and let’s be honest, when a business experiences a security breach, there are never just a few records stolen. Even the smallest businesses have thousands (if not millions) of records on file.
For owners of small pharmacies, this can be pretty alarming. Not only you do have to protect the files of the business side of your store, but you’re also responsible for protecting countless records on patient health information on the prescription half of your store.
There are a few really good retail pharmacy POS systems available today that provide extra security features just for pharmacies, along with 24/7 support services and constant updates/ system scans for viruses and malware threats. For any pharmacy, solid POS systems are definitely the best defense against viruses.
But there are still a few other things that you can do to make sure that your POS software is as secure as possible:
- This is said so often that many people don’t even bother listening, but you’d be surprised by how many businesses break the cardinal rule of cybersecurity: Don’t set all of your passwords to the same word, and definitely don’t set that one word as “password1234.”
- On a similar note, set the name of your Administrator account on your computer to something other than “Administrator.” When hackers break into POS systems, they gain access to all the computer files and accounts, and they’ll know exactly which account to target if the names are too obvious.
- Use a good firewall program, and make sure to update it regularly. Malware and other harmful viruses are created faster than most IT experts can track, but computer software developers are always working to create new firewall updates that protect computers against the newest viruses. The more you update this software, the more protection you’ll have.