So your business doesn’t break while you’re busy running it.
A 5-minute weekly brief that tells you what to ignore, what to fix, and what can wait.

This week’s theme is simple: verify the helper before you hand over the keyboard.

Most small businesses are used to getting help from outside people. A managed IT provider remotes in. A software vendor asks for a screen share. A copier technician needs five minutes at the front desk computer. A web developer asks for admin access.

That is normal. It is also exactly why fake support scams work. The fix is not to distrust everyone. The fix is to make sure your team knows how to confirm that the person asking for access is really the person you already agreed to work with.

If you…

Use technology (yes, pretty much anyone)…

Should you care?

✅ YES – urgently – You let outside support providers, software vendors, web developers, copier technicians, point-of-sale support, accounting support, or IT providers access your computers or business accounts.

🤷‍♀ MAYBE – worth checking – You do not have regular IT support, but your team sometimes gets help through phone calls, screen shares, vendor portals, client portals, shared documents, or remote troubleshooting links.

❌ NO – low priority (for now) – No one outside your business ever gets remote access, admin access, physical access, or USB access to a company device or account.

What’s happening (plain English)?

The scammer is not trying to “hack” in the movie sense. They are trying to sound helpful enough that an employee lets them in and they can just get in without breaking in.

Do this now:

Put this sentence where your team can see it:

No one gets remote access, admin access, or physical access to a company computer unless we verify the request using a contact method we already trust.

That is it. You do not need a long policy to start. You need one clear rule that slows people down at the right moment.

Researchers reported a crime campaign where attackers used manipulated AI chatbot recommendations to push fake download pages for common utilities such as PDFgear (BleepingComputer).

That matters because people are starting to treat AI answers like search results with extra confidence. If an AI tool gives a download link, it can feel like the link has already been checked. It may not be.

For small teams, the rule is practical:

If you use AI at work, this is a good line to add to your internal guidance:

AI can help us find information, but it does not approve software for installation.

Short answer: do not try to decide from the call, email, or chat itself. Verify the request using a contact method you already trust.

Start with three checks:

If the person is legitimate, they should not be offended by a verification step. A real support provider should want your team to confirm access before handing it over.

What to say:

What not to do:

If the person pressures you, that is useful information. Pressure is not proof of fraud, but it is a reason to slow down.

Chrome needs a restart

Google released Chrome fixes for high-severity vulnerabilities, including critical bugs that Malwarebytes said could allow remote code execution after a user visits a malicious webpage (Malwarebytes).

Fix: Open Chrome, go to Settings, choose About Chrome, let it update, then restart the browser. Ask your team to do the same today.

Travel data can turn into better scams

Carnival Cruise Line confirmed a breach affecting nearly 6 million people, and the exposed information analyzed by Have I Been Pwned included names, dates of birth, email addresses, genders, geographic locations, and loyalty program details (BleepingComputer).

Fix: Be cautious with travel, cruise, rewards, refund, and loyalty-program emails that include real personal details. Real details do not make a message safe.

CRM and franchise data are attractive targets

7-Eleven disclosed a breach involving systems used to store franchisee documents, and Have I Been Pwned analyzed exposed data that included names, dates of birth, emails, phone numbers, and physical addresses (BleepingComputer).

Fix: If your business stores customer, franchisee, member, patient, or client records in a cloud system, review who has admin access and turn on multi-factor authentication for every admin account.

This week’s small business security move is not complicated: make access a little harder to fake.

Write down your real support contacts. Tell your team how to verify them. Save the rule somewhere visible. Then make it normal to pause before remote access, admin access, USB access, or unexpected software installs.

You do not have to make your business impossible to fool overnight. You just have to remove the easy moments where someone helpful-sounding can walk right in.

Reply and tell me. I read every response.

~Alexia

P.S. If one of these checks raises a question, bring it to office hours — free and private using, Fridays at 1pm ET. Sometimes a quick 8-minute conversation is enough to figure out what matters and what can wait. Add office hours to your calendar and drop in when you have a question. (Some folks have asked whether ro.am drops you right in with me, face to face. No, don’t worry, you enter a lobby on a web site (or app) called Ro.am, and I let you in. No surprises for either of us. 🙂)

P.P.S. Remember, if you are a small supplier or vendor and you are looking to qualify for bigger contracts, check out our sister newsletter, Quote and Qualify, at newsletter.brightleafreadiness.com.