Information security analysts will likely remember 2016 as the year when cybercrime became a clear and present danger not just for business owners but also for average users and even political parties. In the United States, the revelation about hackers breaching the networks of the two major political campaigns during an election year was a sobering reminder that no one is impervious to cyber-attacks.

If you are an American business owner, you are already a prize target in the eyes of cybercrime groups. Here are four security practices that you should implement in your company in 2017:

Two-Factor Authentication

Brute force strikes, SQL injections and social engineering attacks were responsible for quite a few network intrusions in 2016. Sophisticated hackers known that guessing a single password can be their golden key to break into a network without being detected, except when the system is protected by two-factor authentication, also known as 2FA. This protective measure is simple to implement due to the widespread use of mobile devices in use these days.

Encryption Technology

You should make a New Year’s resolution to install an encryption utility in your office network. You don’t necessarily have to encrypt entire hard drives. You can simply set up an encryption scheme on select network folders. When setting up a master encryption key, be sure to protect it by writing it down and keeping it in a physical safe.

Security Training for Your Employees

The hacking of the Democratic National Committee was almost prevented by an employee who noticed a suspicious pattern of what looked like phishing emails and notified the affected party. Sadly, the notification process was not followed up on. Your staff can learn to spot phishing emails and prevent attacks by attending employee security awareness training classes. The best training sessions include simulations and exploit testing so that your employees can learn to detect threats. Also, you should know that when employers provide security awareness training that caters to both the skill level and position of an employee, it is much more effective and beneficial to the company overall.

Outsource Your Security Needs

If you are able to outsource certain business processes, you may be able to do the same in terms of security. You have a few options in this regard, for example: you can moving your data assets to the cloud so that they can be safely stored and monitored at an offsite data center, or you can also retain a managed IT services provider that will remotely monitor the health, activity and security of your network.

In the end, if you are truly serious about keeping your business data sage in 2017, you should strongly consider implementing the four solutions listed above.