Home is where we should feel most secure, and rightly so.
Ordinary moments repeated over time, however, are how work devices end up exposed. Moving to another room to grab some food. Popping to the toilet. Unremarkable, every-day practices.
Our remote work security checklist focuses on practical controls that maintain a good baseline of security. Try it once, make it routine, and you’ll prevent the kinds of issues that can hurt most because they were entirely preventable.
Why Is Working From Home A Cyber Security Risk?
Work laptops don’t simply become less secure at home. It is the environment around it that does, and this is why securing your company device is important.
Workplaces (should) be more secure. There are less shared users, fewer casual touchpoints, and better-regulated networks. The company laptop, therefore, has a basic level of security. When you’re at home, that same laptop loses those safeguards.
For starters, physical exposure goes up.
At home, we move laptops from room to room, put them on tables, and they are left unattended at points throughout the day. Physical security figures as part of cyber security, and it’s acknowledging this is the first step in securing your laptop at home.
Home is where work and personal life collide, and that creates messy, very human risks.
The NI Cyber Security Centre is blunt about it: don’t let other people use your work device, and don’t treat it like the family laptop.
Additionally, the network you are using is different.
Home Wi-Fi often starts with default settings, old router firmware, or passwords that have been shared with everyone who’s ever visited.
An important step in securing your work device at home is to secure your router, enable the firewall, use anti-virus, and remove unnecessary software and default features. Some of this may be managed by your employer.
Finally, remote access raises the stakes for user identity. In its remote workforce security guidance, Microsoft builds remote security around a Zero Trust approach and emphasises that access should be effectively authenticated and checked for any anomalies before it is granted.
A Checklist For Remote Work Security
This should be your minimum standard when using a company laptop at home. It’s designed to be practical, repeatable, and easy to do without turning you into an IT employee.
1. Lock the Device Every Time You Step Away
Get into the habit of locking your device manually. You could also set an auto-lock timer as an extra level.
2. Laptops Are Valuable. Treat It Like It Is.
Assume that out of sight is safer than out of the way. When you’re finished using your laptop, store your somewhere protected. Don’t leave it on the sofa or in the car.
3. Don’t Let Your Family Use Your Work Laptop
Even checking something quickly can result in dangerous downloads, unfamiliar logins, or unwanted browser extensions.
4. Use Strong Sign-In Creds and MFA
Use long passphrases and never reuse the same passphrase on another account. Implement Multifactor authentication (MFA) as a must-have.
5. Stop Using Devices That Can’t Update
If a laptop can’t receive security updates (because it’s using Windows 10, for example), it’s not a work device. It’s a hazard.
6. Update Quickly
Updates are where most issues get fixed. The longer you wait, the bigger the risk to you and your work. Enable automatic updates and restart when prompted. Some organisations will do this by default.
7. Secure Your Home Wi-Fi
Use a strong Wi-Fi password and enable modern encryption. If your router still has the default admin login or hasn’t been updated in a long time, fix it.
8. Use A Firewall and Keep Security Switched On
Turn on your firewall, keep antivirus software active, and make sure both are properly configured. Your IT team should be able to help if they have not already done this. If security tools feel inconvenient, don’t switch them off. Instead, find ways that makes them better integrated in to your workflow.
9. Remove Unnecessary Software
The more software and apps you install, the more updates you have to manage. The more updates you have to manage, the more opportunities there are for things to go wrong. Remove software you don’t use.
10. Keep Work Data in Work Storage!
Storing work data in approved work areas keeps access controlled and much easier to recover if something goes wrong. Avoid saving work documents to personal cloud accounts or personal backup services. This is a big no-no.
11. Exercise Caution with Unexpected Links and Attachments
If a message tells you to click, download, open, or confirm something, treat it as suspicious. When in doubt, verify the request through a separate, trusted channel before taking any action. Contact your IT team if you are unsure.
Is Your Work Laptop Safe at Home?
If you want remote work to be safe and seamless, your devices need to be secure by default.
That means treating basics such as the above as non-negotiable. For them to work, it means adopting things as habits. Over time, they’ll become second nature.
Start by adopting this remote work security checklist as your baseline standard. When the defaults are strong, you reduce avoidable incidents without slowing anyone down.
If you’d like help turning these basics into a practical, enforceable remote work policy, contact us today. We’ll help you standardize protections across your team so remote work stays productive, and secure.
