How to Protect Yourself and Your Company after the Experian Data Leak
“Cyber-Security is much more than a matter of IT.” (Stéphane Nappo, 2018 Global Chief Information Security Officer of the year)
According to official communications from Experian, a consumer, business and credit information services agency, an individual in South Africa claiming to represent a legitimate client fraudulently requested services from it and was simply given the personal information of clients including cell phone numbers; home phone numbers; work phone numbers; employment details; and identity numbers. Information was also leaked for 793,749 business entities and included: names of the companies; contact details; VAT numbers; and banking details. Experian said that the data had then been placed on a third-party data sharing site on the internet, but added that subsequently that third party had “disabled the links” and that the data had “been removed” after Experian was successful in obtaining and executing an Anton Piller order. This does not, however, mean that the danger is over.
Steps to take to protect yourself and your business
While the breach has been reported to authorities, and South African banks have been working with Experian and the South African Banking Risk Centre (Sabric) to identify which of their customers may have been exposed to the breach and to protect their personal information, the investigation has not yet been concluded. As a result businesses are advised to take numerous steps to prevent any damage that may result from the leak.
The first thing to do is to simply not panic. Despite how bad it sounds the breach does have one very clear silver-lining.
“The compromise of personal information can create opportunities for criminals to impersonate you but does not guarantee access to your banking profile or accounts,” said CEO of the South African Banking Risk Information Centre (SABRIC), Nischal Mewalall. “However, criminals can use this information to trick you into disclosing your confidential banking details.”
What this means is that you, and the staff who have access to your finances and accounts need to be extremely vigilant when it comes to dealing with phone calls from people claiming to be from banks and financial institutions, or who are eager to get additional details or sell you services that may require you to divulge any further personal information.
The Southern African Fraud Preventions Services (SAFPS) has advised companies and individuals to take the following precautionary measures:
- Do not disclose personal information such as passwords and PINs when asked to do so by anyone via telephone, fax, text messages or even email.
- Change your passwords regularly and never share them with anyone else.
- Verify all requests for personal information and only provide it when there is a legitimate reason to do so.
Experian themselves take this advice further, suggesting that anyone who is afraid they may have been affected to “Visit their online bank and financial accounts, and set up any alert features they may have, if they have not already done so. This could help save some time and keep them notified of any unusual events when they occur”.
The company also recommends that everyone checks their credit report as regularly as possible.
“You can check your credit report for free once every twelve months by visiting AnnualCreditReport.com [locally you could visit a site like https://www.transunion.co.za/]. Checking your credit report can help you identify any unusual activity, such as new accounts, new personal information or inquiries,” says Experian CEO, Brian Cassin.
Additionally, should you suspect that your identity has been compromised, notify your bank and apply immediately for a free Protective Registration listing with SAFPS. This service alerts SAFPS members, including banks and credit providers that your identity has been compromised and additional care must be taken to confirm they are transacting with the legitimate identity holder.
Consumers wanting to apply for a Protective Registration can email SAFPS at protection@safps.org.za.
If you are uncertain as to how to proceed or if you don’t understand any of the processes, get professional help to evaluate and protect your accounts as soon as possible.
Employee Health and Wellbeing: A Strategic Priority for COVID-19 and Beyond
“It goes without saying that no company, small or large, can win over the long run without energized employees who believe in the mission and understand how to achieve it.” (Jack Welch, former CEO of GE)
| The health and wellbeing (HWB) of employees has a substantial impact on business success and sustainability, and this has never been more pronounced than during the lockdown.
Employee HWB is vital for a company to sustain itself during the lockdown, but making your employees’ HWB a strategic priority creates a competitive edge that will be crucial for success now and beyond COVID-19. Why is employee HWB a strategic priority?
“Most successful and innovative organisations today make employee health and wellbeing a key focus of their business strategies. It is not something to which they simply pay lip-service: they spend a lot of time, energy and money in developing workplaces that enhance wellness and consider those to be a crucial component of their organisational business strategies,” says Freeman Nomvalo, CEO of the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA). “These companies would therefore probably be more resilient during the pandemic, as employees are able to remain productive due to a supportive workplace environment.” Employee HWB also provides an opportunity to make a positive difference, playing a leadership role in our communities and in our country. According to SAICA’s Health and Wellbeing Advisory Group (HWAG): “Measuring employee health and wellness provides an indication of the wellbeing of the organisation. It is also a direct indicator of the wellbeing of a country’s workforce, making health reporting a national priority and not just a corporate one. Health reporting can help organisations create and promote environments for healthy behaviours, which will extend not only to employees but also to their families. This can result in healthier workforces, as well as healthier cities and countries.” “Such reporting also meets the government’s call to action for the private sector to partner with the public sector in responding to the challenge of NCDs [noncommunicable diseases]. This helps organisations fulfil their shared value and corporate citizenship obligations, and will have profound positive effects on individuals, companies and societies as a whole.” So how can a company go about tapping into all these benefits of an employee HWB? As the saying goes: What is measured is managed…
What is measured is managed… HWAG believes that companies should report on the following components:
This list of components also serves as a list of key focus areas. These components, many of which may have only received passing attention previously, may be prioritised and elevated as companies strive to ensure a safe and sustainable working environment for their employees during COVID-19 and beyond. Integrating these components into the business is vital for sustaining the company and its employees. Employee HWB: What works best? What seems to work best for large companies are the core and more traditional issues, including occupational health and safety; medical benefits for full-time workers; having a dedicated person responsible for employee health and wellbeing; a smoke-free workplace; and communal spaces where employees can eat, relax, interact with co-workers or hold private conversations. Programmes, policies and practices around a smoke-free workplace received the most positive response from smaller companies, followed by the same issues raised by larger companies: regulatory requirements and policies for occupational health and safety, as well as medical benefits for full-time workers. The survey also points to room for improvement: the majority of companies do not believe it is necessary to get involved in the following areas at the moment: incentives for a healthy lifestyle, physical exercise, reduction of alcohol consumption, tobacco use cessation, sleep management, health coaching, health risk assessment, and the extension of available programmes to family members and other dependants. This is despite the fact that these areas are key to the management of NCDs, which poses a significant threat to workforce productivity.
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The Feasibility of a Freelancing Business in Uncertain Times
Business start-up planning has been extensively covered over the past twenty years and longer, and without understating its importance or re-inventing the wheel, perhaps it has been overplayed. Much training is available on the Internet, including templates and guidelines provided by banks and the SA Department of Trade and Industry. To start a freelancing business can be a challenge – and then some. Thus, following a business plan infrastructure with the use of a project planning tool is the best route to follow.
Why perform a feasibility study?
The feasibility study is a vitally important step in the well-known business planning process, not only pre start-up. In fact, it is the most important step because, if the business idea is not feasible, there is no point continuing with it. There are often more reasons for the business to fail than to succeed. Many renowned business analysts believe that only one in forty new businesses succeed and materialise in accordance with their original plan. Another good time for doing a feasibility study is when a business needs to be restructured to increase profitability, improve production, reduce production costs and overheads, increase sales/services income, expand the market reach, and many other valid reasons.
In the normal scheme of business planning, one deals with deciding on what type of business entity one wants to set up such as a Sole Trader, a Partnership, a Private Company, a Close Corporation, and then the drafting of various reports are needed in order to gauge the feasibility and to make the right decisions going forward.
What information do you need to prepare a feasibility study?
The list of matters to be decided and the necessary analyses needed follows, such as are usually covered in the typical business plan.
- The services or products to be offered.
- Establish the professional standards and qualifications required to operate as a freelancer in your field of expertise.
- The equipment and tools needed.
- Start-up expenses, including legal and business analysis services.
- Initial capital requirements.
- The target market to be accessed and establish whether there is space for you in it.
- The economy relating to that market, current demand, future growth opportunities.
- Determine what barriers exist at present which may hinder your success.
- How best to promote your products or services.
- Distribution channels and agencies.
- Operational plan.
- Legal environment and statutory requirements
- Establish a system of record keeping
- Bank services needed – a separate bank account for the business is strongly advised.
- If staff need to be employed, establish the Human Resource policies and SARS requirements.
- Do the costing of each product and service very accurately.
- Calculate selling prices based on all costs plus mark up.
- Establish the total you personally need to earn per month. When an hourly rate will be charged for your work, you will need to calculate your hourly rate.
- Compare your prices to those pertaining to the freelance industry of your services.
- Draft the projected financial plan, a detailed budget for twelve months.
- Draft the projected cash flow for twelve months.
- Draft a Break-Even analysis.
- Draft a starting balance sheet.
- Draft a SWOT Analyses – Strengths, Weaknesses, and Opportunities.
Some business plans have the feasibility study way down in a list similar to the above list, but perhaps a better view is that most of these tasks need to be done in order for the feasibility or viability of a business plan to be ascertained.
Assistance and collaboration
For an aspiring freelancer, these are all important steps to follow. It is also important to search for organisations and associations that provide vital services and advice for those in the various freelance fields. Let’s take as an example SAFREA (the Southern African Freelancer’s Association). They advocate for and support freelance workers in the communications fields. They also provide resources, tools, training, and networking to strengthen freelance careers. Their network includes hundreds of talented writers, editors, proof-readers, graphic designers, illustrators, researchers, translators, photographers, and other experts in media and communications. Another good example would be Project Management South Africa for freelance and professional project managers.
Membership associations like these are great for collaborating with fellow freelancers and professionals for professional advice, current industry standards relative to their professional fields, the current going rates for different work, up to date market research, training courses, and to finding available work.
As noted earlier in this article, the Internet is packed with valuable information such as from the DTI, SARS, the banks, and other websites through which one can glean the necessary information and assistance in one’s quest.
Freelancing is normally a challenging type of business to operate, but as business start-up and functionality are even more so during the pandemic and state of disaster, it is very important to ask your accountant for guidance and for help in drafting an accurate feasibility study and business plan. Wasting time and finances in going it alone would not be the preferred route to take.
