It’s time we talk about cyber security in the Early Years

When you think ‘cyber security,’ you probably don’t think early education. 

And that’s the problem.

For most of us, cyber security might seem like the realm of Hollywood, or top-secret spies. Could you imagine James Bond on assignment at Playful Monkeys Preschool? I bet he’s terrible with children.

But when more and more of our lives involve a phone, laptop or tablet, we’ve all got to think twice about how we protect the data that goes through those devices. In your Early Years setting, you’re working with sensitive information like parents’ payment details, children’s medical records, and all sorts of private correspondences. 

That’s where cyber security comes into play.

Last month, the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) published their first-ever guidelines for cyber security within the Early Years sector. It’s the first time that a government has ever published such guidance specifically for the Early Years — so today, we’re going to talk about why it’s coming out now, and what it means for you and your daily practice in early education.

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Why does cyber security matter for the Early Years sector?

When you stop to think about it, the day-to-day operations of your Early Years setting generate quite a bit of sensitive data. So much happens through a tablet, computer or smartphone, and just about everything you do — from collecting tuition payments to messaging a team member — gets documented on your devices.

Some of these digital receipts are pretty boring and commonplace. But some of them can be very sensitive, so we’ve got to take steps to keep that data protected.

Examples of these sensitive digital records might include:

• Parent’s addresses, contact information and credit card details
• Children’s immunization and medical records
• Photos and videos of the children at your setting
• Your payroll information, and your staff’s banking details
• Private correspondences between you, your team and your families

In a more extreme scenario, there’s a chance that some cyber criminal might steal this data and hold it for ransom. But keeping these digital records safe is bigger than that. If you lost some of this information, it might make it impossible to run your setting like normal. Or, losing other details might jeopardize the trust of the families in your care.

It’s not so much that you as an Early Years practitioner are at particular risk. Rather, as the NCSC explains, it’s that pretty much everybody could stand to be safer about their data.

“Regardless of the size and nature of your setting, the information that you hold is of value to a criminal. And although they may not target your setting directly, it's all too easy to be damaged by scam emails that cyber criminals send out indiscriminately to millions of businesses,” the NCSC writes in their guidance document.

That’s why we’ve got to be proactive about cyber security, and think about all the ways we can keep ourselves covered.

Cyber security is more than just thwarting hackers

Before we get all wound up about shadowy criminals and digital crimes, it’s worth noting that there are a lot more everyday considerations to cyber security, too.

In a broader sense, cyber security is just about keeping your data safe. Short of a hacker attack, any number of things could happen that might cause sensitive data to fall into the wrong hands, or cause you to lose information you need to run your child care setting.

Some examples of these more commonplace cyber security concerns might include:

• Losing a computer or tablet to water damage, or simply dropping it
• Physical theft of mobile phones, tablets or computers
• Accidentally downloading a harmful virus, even if it wasn’t specifically targeting your setting

Avoiding these threats comes down to being safe about how we store and secure our data, and being clever and cautious about avoiding things like email phishing scams.

If you’re running your child care setting without some sort of management software, it’s on you to ensure you’re handling your data safely and securely. This means protecting any sensitive data behind passwords, making regular backups of your digital records, and following your applicable personal privacy laws.

But child care management systems like Famly will take care of these steps for you. If you’d like to learn more about how Famly takes a lot of the guesswork out of cyber security, you can check out our security and privacy page right here.

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