Focused cyber security advice and guidance during COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic has proven to be an extremely disruptive event, affecting all components of society. The IT world is not immune. The pandemic has forced both public and private sectors to rethink how, when, and where work is performed. Traditional models of office versus home-based work environments have been completely inverted; in many cases, most employees are now working remotely. This inversion has caused IT management, implementers, and clients to scramble to adapt to a new way of working. Unfortunately, this rapid transformation presents both new and unique opportunities for threat actors to take advantage of. The entire IT hierarchy, from management to client, must be made explicitly aware of this fact and take every precaution possible.

The Canadian Centre for Cyber Security (Cyber Centre) has created a valuable collection of advice and guidance products, many of which are now more relevant than ever. To assist you during this disruptive time, we curated a selection of our products and organized them by area of interest. We hope this helps, and, as always, we are here to assist you whenever possible. You may find our complete list of guidance products at: Information and guidance

IT management guidance

• Top 10 IT security actions: #6 provide tailored cyber security training (ITSM.10.093)
• Cloud security risk management (ITSM.50.062)
• Top 10 IT security actions to protect internet-connected networks and information (ITSM.10.189)

IT Implementer guidance

• Implementation guidance: Email domain protection (ITSP.40.065)
• Cyber centre data centre virtualization report: Best practices for data centre virtualization (ITSP.70.010)
• Steps to address data spillage in the cloud (ITSAP.50.112)
• Security tips for organizations with remote workers (ITSAP.10.016)
• Using virtual desktop at-home and in-office (ITSAP.70.111)
• Security considerations for mobile device deployments (ITSAP.70.002)
• Protecting your organization from denial of service attacks (ITSAP.80.100)

Client awareness

• Don't take the bait: Recognize and avoid phishing attacks
• Cyber hygiene for COVID-19
• Video-teleconferencing (ITSAP.10.216)
• How updates secure your devices (ITSAP.10.096)
• Secure your accounts and devices with multi-factor authentication (ITSAP.30.030)
• Protect your organization from malware (ITSAP.00.057)
• Virtual private networks (ITSAP.80.101)
• Ransomware: How to prevent and recover (ITSAP.00.099)
• Rethink your password habits to protect your accounts from hackers (ITSAP.30.036)
• Best practices for passphrases and passwords (ITSAP.30.032)
• Using bluetooth technology (ITSAP.00.011)
• Spotting malicious emails (ITSAP.00.100)

Additional information

• RSS feed
• Alert and advisories
• Contracting with managed service providers
• Canadian shield—sharing the Cyber Centre’s threat intelligence to protect Canadians during the COVID-19 pandemic