Why Q4 Is Your Business’s Biggest Cyber Risk

Between October and December 2024, Kenya’s national cyber incident response team detected 840 million cyber-threat events. Most African business owners believe they are too small to be considered a target. They believe that hackers go after banks and governments, and not their 20-person company. That belief is expensive. Attackers do not think about your size, they think about your defences. And right now, across African businesses, the defences are laughably weak. Regional telemetry recorded over 131 million web-threat detections across Africa in 2024, with spyware and ransom detections rising year-on-year. Healthcare saw a 95% jump in ransomware incidents in October 2024 alone, a single month. In January 2025, South Africa’s Weather Service went offline after a security breach, disrupting critical public services.For a clearer context, regional telemetry is basically security cameras for the internet. Systems that count and track cyber attacks across Africa. Spyware is software that secretly watches everything you do on your computer. Every password you type, every email you send, every bank login. Ransomware is the nightmare scenario. Malicious software that locks every file on your system and demands money to unlock them. African businesses are running million-shilling operations on systems designed for corner shops. Spreadsheets holding customer data. Email chains containing bank details. Passwords written on sticky notes. WhatsApp groups sharing sensitive financial information. Attackers see this, and they are circling.

Why Q4 is a Hunting SeasonThe last quarter of any year is Christmas for cybercriminals.Think about what happens in your business between October and December. Year-end financial reconciliations, holiday shopping surges, bonus payments, inventory movements, teams working remotely, temporary staff with access to systems, and accountants rushing to close books by December 31st.Everyone is distracted, guards drop, and systems are stretched. That is when attackers strike.Kaspersky’s data shows that threat actors ran broad scanning and exploitation campaigns across Africa throughout 2024, utilizing automated scripts that tested millions of entry points in search of a single unblocked door. Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, and Algeria topped the target lists, particularly in the telecoms and financial services sectors.But here is the uncomfortable truth, the attack surface is not shrinking in 2025. If anything, it is expanding.

More businesses are going digital. More transactions are happening online. More customer data is being collected. And most businesses are doing all of this without proper security architecture.

Your ERP System Is a Goldmine (To Them)ERP system stands for Enterprise Resource Planning. It is the central software that runs your business. It handles your money, your inventory, your customers, and your staff all in one place, instead of scattered across spreadsheets and different apps

And here is what attackers actually want from your business’s ERP system:

Payroll data. Names, national IDs, bank accounts, salary details. These are perfect for identity theft and financial fraud.

Financial records. Bank statements, transaction histories, supplier details. They are sellable on dark web markets or used for targeted fraud.

Customer information. Contact details, purchase histories, and payment methods. They are worth money to competitors or scammers.

System access. Once inside your ERP, they can move laterally, accessing email, cloud storage, and connected banking systems.

If you are running your business on spreadsheets, the risk multiplies. No audit trails. No access controls. No encryption. No automatic backups. Just files sitting on laptops that could be stolen, corrupted, or held for ransom.The Common Misbelief

There is always a false sense of security in that, “we use passwords, "we have antivirus, “we back up our files... sometimes." These are not defences. These are participation trophies.

Modern cyberattacks do not work by guessing passwords. Instead, they trick your people. Your accountant receives an email that looks exactly like it's from your bank, and they click. That is phishing. Or they directly manipulate your receptionist into giving away login details by pretending to be IT support. That is social engineering.INTERPOL and Afripol operations in 2024 and 2025 disrupted multiple cybercrime networks and arrested over 1,000 suspects across Africa, with evidence of both the scale of organized cybercrime and improving law enforcement response. But arrests happen after the damage is done.How to Actually Protect Your Business

Real security is not about installing software and hoping for the best. It is about architecture. And this is how you adequately prop your architecture.

1. Cloud ERP systems with a proper security posture

Modern cloud platforms like Zoho build security into the foundation. Not as an add-on. Encrypted data at rest and in transit. Multi-factor authentication is standard. Role-based access controls so your sales team cannot see payroll data. Automatic security updates without you lifting a finger. Audit trails showing who accessed what, when.

Compare that to a spreadsheet on someone's laptop.

2. Automated backups with tested restore procedures

Having backups means nothing if you have never tried to restore them. Schedule quarterly restore drills. Make sure your backups are isolated from your main systems. Store copies in multiple locations.

3. Security hygiene

Have unique passwords for every system. Ensure there are password managers for your team. Multi-factor authentication everywhere. Perform regular software updates. Immediate access revocation when staff leave. Enroll your team for security training that happens more than once a year.

4. Vulnerability awareness in your workflows

Understanding that your weakest link is usually a person, not a system. The accountant who clicks on a fake invoice. The manager who uses "Password123" because it is easy to remember. The IT person who gives everyone admin access because it is less hassle.The Cost of Ignoring It

The cost of inaction (in real numbers) can be overwhelming.

IBM's 2025 Cost of a Data Breach report puts the global average cost at USD 4.88 million. For African SMEs, even a fraction of that can be fatal.

But the real cost is not just financial. You lose customer trust. How do you tell clients their data was compromised because you stored it in an unprotected spreadsheet? You attract regulatory penalties for non-compliance. You might experience operational paralysis, and you will have damaged your reputation.The healthcare sector's 95% ransomware spike in October 2024 was not just a statistic. Those were hospitals that could not access patient records and pharmacies that could not process prescriptions. Clinics that had to turn patients away.Steps to Strengthen Your Defences 

To avert such an incident, you should audit who has access to your business systems. Remove anyone who should not. Enable multi-factor authentication on your email, banking, and ERP systems. Test your backup restore process. Actually, try to recover a file from backup. Schedule a security training session for your team, even if it is just 30 minutes on recognizing phishing emails. Finally, if you are still running your business on spreadsheets, book a consultation with someone who can migrate you to a proper cloud ERP.

The Bottom LineAttacks are getting more sophisticated. The targets are getting broader, and the consequences are getting more severe. Your business is either protected or exposed.

You do not need a million-shilling security budget to start protecting yourself properly. You need awareness, better architecture, and the willingness to treat security as seriously as you treat sales targets.

The question is not whether you will be targeted.

The question is whether you will be ready when it happens.