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Are you working more hours than you used to?

Dubai - Nearly one-third of people are spending more time working than they did before.

Work-life balance is being blurred with more people having to adopt professional environment at home, according to a new survey.
Nearly a third (31 per cent) of people are spending more time working than they did before the Covid-19 pandemic, according to a new report titled How Covid-19 changed the way people work by Kaspersky. However, 46 per cent said they have increased the amount of time they spend on personal activity. 
Workers are also developing a habit of using their personal services for working purposes. As many as 42 per cent of employees use personal email accounts for work-related matters, and 49 per cent admit their usage has increased when working from home. A total of 38 per cent use personal messengers that have not been approved by their IT departments, with 60 per cent of them do it more often in their new circumstances.
"It is necessary to find a balance between user convenience, business necessity and security. To achieve this, a company should provide access to services based on the principle of only supplying minimal, necessary privileges, implement a VPN and use secure and approved corporate systems. These types of software may have certain restrictions that slightly reduce usability, but offer greater assurances in providing security measures," said Andrey Evdokimov, chief information security officer at Kaspersky.
The report also revealed that it has become harder for workers to separate working and personal activity. Around 55 per cent of workers say they are reading more news now than they were before they started working from home and 60 per cent of this activity is done on devices used for work.
reporters@khaleejtimes.com
 
How to keep data safe while working from home?
> Schedule basic security awareness training for employees. This can be done online and cover essential practices - account and password management, email security, endpoint security
> Ensure devices, software, applications and services are kept updated with the latest patches
> Install proven protection software on all endpoints, including mobile devices, and switch on firewalls. Any solution used should include protection from web threats and email phishing
For users working from personal devices:
> Using a reliable security solution for comprehensive protection from a wide range of threats
> Download educational and entertaining content strictly from trusted sources