From Welcome to Farewell: The Cybersecurity Risks involved in Employee Onboarding and Offboarding

This article looks at the cyber security dangers associated with onboarding and offboarding an employee or contractor. It also provides guidance for avoiding the potential cyber security traps with both welcoming new staff, and saying farewell to existing employees. Cyber attackers are forever vigilant (or have software that is!) so don't get caught out.

Imagine handing a stranger the keys to your office, granting them access to filing cabinets, safes, and confidential client conversations without setting any rules, checking they understand how to handle these assets properly or knowing when they'll return the keys. That’s essentially what happens when businesses overlook cybersecurity during employee onboarding and offboarding.

Every time a new hire joins, it can be exciting. Someone bringing fresh ideas, energy and value, or much needed reinforcements to a depleted team.

However, whether it’s someone joining or leaving there’s a window of vulnerability and If that window isn’t managed carefully, it can be pried open by cybercriminals, misused by insiders, or simply forgotten and left unlocked.

Many businesses overlook the critical importance of securing the employee onboarding and offboarding process. From accidentally creating accounts with too many permissions to forgotten access after someone leaves, these gaps can be exploited by attackers or even by disgruntled insiders.

In this post, we uncover the hidden cybersecurity dangers tied to onboarding and offboarding and explain how even small oversights can lead to data breaches, insider threats, and financial damage. More importantly, we’ll give ideas on how to fix them.