We live in a world where certain elements of our business and personal life our shared, and this can be hugely beneficial for everyone involved. However, this online world that we live in and use on a regular basis can be full of risks and potential danger.

Criminals operate online too, and just like someone who is prepared to walk into your home and steal from you, they will access your personal space and steal valuable information and data from you to be used without your knowledge.

These cyber criminals can be exceptionally damaging to business as well, with business data and potential trade secrets being sold to the highest bidder.

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Here are six very good reasons as to why you need to protect your documents and data as soon as possible:

1) Mobility: With the development of Wi-Fi and mobile devices, documents and data can get around far easier now than ever before.

How people use technology and share documents is changing, and the amount of files that we want others to view online is growing at a rapid pace. Owners of such documents, data and other media files can be forgiven to feeling a little on edge. Their work, which they have spent resource in developing, can be freely viewed and distributed amongst both desktop and mobile devices, with very little security in place to help control who views and distributes their work.

As people view these documents ‘on the move’, the sensitive nature of them can become lost. Therefore, any personal or sensitive data that is shared is available for others to view in a matter of seconds.

2) Piracy: Data is power, ask any business and they will tell you the same. This makes your data extremely valuable to your competitors. Your data says a lot about you, your customers and your suppliers, and on a personal level, your data can contain some very personal information indeed.

Your credit card or debit card details that you have used to purchase online before are stored somewhere, and this is the sort of information that requires protection from cyber criminals.

3) Compliance & Sensitive Information: There are a number of laws and regulations that have been put into place over recent years that are designed to protect our information, whether that is business information or personal information.

A number of brands and organisations promote their security procedures, advising us that our information is safe with them. However, events over recent months have seen some of the biggest brands and organisations suffer from cyber crime with our data being stolen and sold on the black market to the highest bidder. It seems that they are always one step ahead of such laws and regulations.

4) The Internet: If you are a business owner or not, you must agree that the internet is a wonderful place. However, it also provides a huge portal for others to steal your information if you put it online for others to benefit from.

5) Document Journey: Whether you believe you have control over your documents or not, if they are placed online it is more than likely that someone will use that information to their own advantage. It may be the case that there is no intent from the third party to harm your revenue, but with or without intention of the third party, you can rest assured that you will have no knowledge of the location of any of your owned material.

Knowing where your information is, especially in this ever changing and sometimes hectic online world, must be an essential part of your business processes going forward. If this is not achieved then you will always fear where your documents are, who has them and how they can be used to harm your business and brand. There are a number of products, check out; http://www.locklizard.com/, that can help you protect your documents.

6) Trade Secrets: It is a competitive world out there, and as a business owner, a world where you want to stay one step ahead. Even internal documents can be distributed and leave the business, may be falling into the wrong hands.

These are the six reasons why you should be protecting your data and documentation, and there are plenty of ways in which you can do it. Document protection and a review of how you manage your information, both in-house and externally, is a great place to start.