The importance of geo-blocking for your business’ cybersecurity

The Internet gives people access to all kinds of information, websites and media in just a few clicks. From blogs, eBooks, photos, audio, videos and podcasts to a wide range of webpages, eCommerce sites and app stores – everything is at our fingertips today.

But while this ease of access is convenient, especially for businesses that have staff working remotely or from home, it also unfortunately comes with risks to digital assets and overall cybersecurity.

Cybercriminals from potentially high-risk locations around the world can take advantage of your exposed content, valuable information and business systems to gain unauthorised access, steal IP and potentially damage your reputation.

Without the protection of security controls such as geo-blocking, your business may suffer from malware, ransomware, privacy breaches, phishing attacks and other forms of data theft.

Geo-blocking can actually obstruct access from certain countries to safeguard your business from vulnerabilities online. Let’s discuss how it works and the benefits geo-blocking offers you.

What is geo-blocking?

Geo-blocking is a type of technology that either authorises or denies user access to specific online content based on their current geographical location.

Platforms and websites with active geo-blocking check IP addresses to determine where their users are logging in from and if this location is authorised to proceed. Acting as a computer’s online addresses, these IP addresses are made up of a long string of unique numbers assigned to network-connected devices by their Internet service provider (ISP).

Geo-blocking tailors who can see what you release and provide online. Through it, you can restrict specific regions or countries from viewing or using your data, media and other online content, therefore ensuring you’re only giving access to the regions, businesses and parties you trust.

What are the common business purposes of geo-blocking?

Geo-blocking serves a variety of important purposes for businesses, including:

1. Regulating the release of content to comply with licensing deals

Video-sharing platforms and streaming services like Netflix, YouTube, Hulu, Amazon Prime, ABC and iView have licensing agreements with copyright owners who decide where their content is to be made available.

In the same way, you can use geo-blocking to exclude some disallowed locations from viewing the content you produce. This enables you to protect licensed and copyrighted digital assets and prevent any breach of agreement you have with your partner businesses.

2. Personalising promotions and pricing per location

Geo-blocking can also be used to segment global markets, allowing you to customise local campaigns, charge regionally specific prices and apply local taxes based on location. Through geo-blocking, you can also restrict customer access to certain product pages and limit overseas orders as well.

3. Avoiding legal problems

There might be instances where your business doesn’t have legal permission or the right to operate in a specific region or country.

Geo-blocking restricts users from these locations, so they won’t be able to gain access to your site or online content. As a result, this can prevent complications with their local government bodies.

4. Strengthening cybersecurity

Google’s Safe Browsing service reported that the number of phishing websites has just about doubled from 30,000 in January 2020 to almost 60,000 in April 2020. A study by the research firm, Symantec, also listed the top 20 countries with the highest rate of cybercrime.

Geo-blocking is therefore often implemented to avoid fraud, block malicious traffic, manage bandwidth and implement location-aware authentication. This enables you to regulate access, so you can proactively block cyber criminals and control risks from anywhere around the world.

Why is geo-blocking an important part of your business’ overall cybersecurity?

The number of Internet users increases each day, making your business’ networks more vulnerable to the risks of unwanted infiltration and attacks than ever before.

Geo-blocking is one part of proactive cybersecurity defence that gives your digital assets greater protection from entities that could potentially breach your digital security to harm your business by blocking suspicious logins from foreign locations outside of your country or region. Geo-blocking also prevents your employees from accessing risky websites and platforms that are hosted on servers located outside Australia (or wherever you operate from).

With geo-blocking, you can have greater confidence knowing that your content and data isn’t exposed to people who could affect not only your organisation but your customers, stakeholders and staff too.

At Centrix, we ensure geo-blocking is working to your advantage. Our team of IT specialists can enhance your cybersecurity without compromising your business’ productivity.

Centrix configures geo-blocking to suit your IT needs

As your reliable Managed Service Provider, Centrix can configure geo-blocking so that it benefits your business.

You can be confident knowing our specialists have the right cybersecurity and geo-blocking solutions to provide your business and team with the right online protection without losing access to critical websites, platforms and media they need to perform their jobs and achieve business’ goals.

With the latest IT technologies and proactive staff training, we safeguard your business against cybersecurity threats while also supporting your employees no matter if they’re in the office, at home or working remotely.

Centrix manages your complete IT needs for you, so you can focus on your business and your customers.

Let Centrix support your IT and cybersecurity needs

Our team at Centrix is always ready – we help small businesses all the way up to corporate organisations succeed by managing, supporting and protecting critical IT infrastructure.

Backed by our extensive knowledge and expertise, Centrix is here to support your organisation with comprehensive IT Connectivity and Collaboration Service Packages, Cloud IT, Cybersecurity Protection, Managed IT Services and other IT Solutions.

So, are you ready to thrive in today’s digital landscape?

To learn more about our Managed IT services, book an IT Health Check or contact us today.