Cyber Protect

Early Warning is a free National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) service designed to inform your organisation of potential cyber attacks on your network, as soon as possible. The service uses a variety of information feeds from the NCSC, trusted public, commercial and closed sources, which includes several privileged feeds which are not available elsewhere.

Early Warning is open to all UK organisations who hold a static IP address or domain name.

Benefits of the Early Warning Service

• By signing up to Early Warning your organisation will be alerted to the presence of malware and vulnerabilities affecting your network. The service should be used to complement existing security controls and not as a replacement.
• Early Warning enhances your organisation’s security by increasing your awareness of the low-grade incidents which could become much bigger issues, so you can act on them earlier.
• You can have increased confidence in the security of your network.
• The service is free and fully funded by the NCSC.

Learn more about the NCSC Early Warning Service

Aimed at organisations with less than 250 employees, the NCSC Small Business Guide provides an easy to follow five step guide to securing organisations from many of the most frequently seen cyber attacks. 

Step 1 - Backing up your data

Five things to consider when backing up your data.

Step 2 - Protecting your organisation from malware

Five free and easy-to-implement tips that can help prevent malware damaging your organisation.

Step 3 - Keeping your smartphones (and tablets) safe

Five quick tips that can help keep your mobile devices (and the information stored on them) secure.

Step 4 - Using passwords to protect your data

Five things to keep in mind when using passwords.

Step 5 - Avoiding phishing attacks

Steps to help you identify the most common phishing attacks.

Read the NCSC Small Business Guide

Cyber Essentials is an effective, Government backed scheme that can help an organisation, whatever its size, to protect itself against many of the most common cyber attacks.

Why should you get Cyber Essentials?

• Reassure customers that you are working to secure your IT against cyber attack
• Attract new business with the promise you have cyber security measures in place
• You have a clear picture of your organisation's cyber security level
• Some Government contracts require Cyber Essentials certification

With two levels of certification available, you can test your readiness for Cyber Essentials with the online readiness tool - https://getreadyforcyberessentials.iasme.co.uk/ 

Learn more about Cyber Essentials

Whether in response to a cyber incident or because your organisation wants to improve staff awareness of current threats, the Cyber Crime Centre offers free cyber awareness sessions to local organisations and community groups which can be carried out in person or through your platform of choice. 

Aimed at the everyday user, these sessions provide easy to follow advice aimed at encouraging individuals adopt cyber behaviours that will help protect both themselves, their families and the organisation to which they belong. Sessions cover topics such as:

• Current Cyber Threats
• Phishing
• Digital Footprints  
• Advice channels 
• Securing accounts

Decisions and Disruptions is a table top exercise designed to explore the decisions that people make in order to protect their businesses from modern day threats. Lasting approximately 1 hr, the exercise tests people's response to both hacking and malware attacks, in addition to physical security threats. 

The Police Service of Northern Ireland's Cyber Crime Centre are grateful to our Cyber Protect colleagues at the City Of London Police ‘Cyber Griffin’ team for their support in delivering this exercise to Northern Ireland organisations.

Designed as a fun and interactive cyber-security exercise, the ‘Cyber Escape Room’ aims to teach staff good online security behaviours through a variety of problem-solving tasks. 

Covering core cyber security topics such as phishing, social engineering and passwords, teams compete to escape in the quickest time. Adopted from the Metropolitan Police Service, the Cyber Escape Room is a great way to introduce cyber awareness to staff across an organisation.  

For more information contact [email protected]

Businesses and organisations in Northern Ireland can access Police CyberAlarm, an award-winning free tool funded by the Home Office which you can access through your local police force. 

Police CyberAlarm works alongside an organisation’s current cyber security products, such as the firewall, Network Intrusion Detection System (IDS) and Intrusion Protection System (IPS), Anti-Spam and Network Anti-Virus to help members better understand the cyber threats they face.

Data received by the Police CyberAlarm Server is then used to create regular reports on potential malicious activity seen by individual members as well as reports containing threat trends seen across the member network. Members can then use this reported intelligence to update their defences to better protect themselves from cyber threats.

Vulnerability Scanning can be added and used to scan an organisations website and external IP addresses, providing regular reports of all known vulnerabilities.

Learn more about the Police Cyber Alarm