Data continues to be one of your business’s most valuable assets, which also unfortunately makes it one of your biggest liabilities if it isn’t protected properly. Data volumes continue to grow, leading cybercriminals to develop new tactics to take advantage, so small and mid-sized businesses like yours must treat data protection as a year-round priority.
Setting clear data protection resolutions for 2026 will help you reduce risk, meet changing compliance requirements, and maintain customer trust in the face of high-profile data breaches in the news.
What data threats do you need to watch for in 2026?
Thanks to AI assistance, cyberthreats are becoming more targeted, automated, and disruptive. Old cybercriminal tactics have gotten upgrades to make them even harder to detect and prevent, so your tactics and tools must evolve as well.
Advanced phishing
Social engineering attacks continue to grow more convincing, especially with the use of AI-generated messages and real-time voice modulation (“vishing”). These highly effective attacks convince unwitting victims to hand over login credentials such as passwords, enabling criminals to siphon valuable data.
Insider risk
Whether accidental or malicious, employees with excessive access can expose data through misconfigured permissions, lost devices, or unauthorized file sharing. As hybrid and remote work become more commonplace and connected apps proliferate, data sprawl increases, making visibility and control more difficult.
Third-party and supply chain risks
Vendors, cloud platforms, and software providers that handle or store your data can have security weaknesses, which in turn become your problem. Every time you integrate a third party app into your operations or partner with another organization, you increase the number of potential vulnerabilities. Without proper oversight, data can be exposed due to the carelessness of others.
Practical data protection tips for 2026
Protecting your data in 2026 requires specialized tools and up-to-date best practices. Here are some steps you can take to minimize your data risk and have peace of mind going into the new year.
Audit your data
Protecting data starts with knowing where it lives and how it moves. Begin by identifying and classifying your data based on sensitivity and business impact. Then, trace the flow of data within and outside of your organization to identify potential weak points. For example, financial data can move between accounting software, spreadsheets, and email attachments. If any of these points are not properly secured, your data is at risk. Understanding which data is critical allows you to apply stronger protections where they matter most and avoid unnecessary spending and complexity.
Reign in access
Not everyone in your organization needs access to all your data. Role-based access control is a common method for managing data access, where users are assigned specific roles and permissions based on their job function. This helps reduce the risk of unauthorized access or accidental exposure of sensitive data.
Multifactor authentication also adds an extra layer of protection in the event of a compromised password.
Encrypt
Data encryption is essential both at rest and in transit (while it is stored on a device, and when it is transferred to another device, respectively). Encryption keeps your data unreadable, even if it’s intercepted or accessed without authorization. Although many modern cloud services have built-in encryption, you should still check your configurations to see that they’re enabled and not causing unnecessary lag.
Prioritize Backup
Regular data backups give you a safety net for recovering lost or corrupted data. However, to keep up with new threats, your backups should be modernized, meaning they must be automated, housed in secure data storage, and tested frequently.
This ensures that even if your data is compromised, you don’t lose important data and you can resume operations quickly.
Address the human element
Employees are your first line of defense, and regular, up-to-date training helps them recognize phishing attempts, avoid suspicious downloads, and stop risky data-handling behaviors. None of your advanced data protection tools will make a difference if your employees fall for an advanced vishing attack, so be sure they are current on the latest threats.
DTA (Don’t Trust Anybody)
Finally, review third-party data handling practices to verify whether vendors meet your security expectations and comply with relevant regulations. Check contracts to see if they clearly define data protection responsibilities, breach notification procedures, and audit rights, and ditch partners and service providers that don’t respect your data security.
To keep your data safe in 2026 and beyond, contact Liberty Center One. As a managed IT and data services provider, we know what it takes to secure your data from modern threats and have the tools to make it happen.