Dealership Insights Forum September Recap: Compliance Best Practices

Dealers convened again this month for the Dealership Insights Forum. Following last month’s forum about F&I Products, this month dealers discussed how you can ensure your dealership is up to compliance standards now, so you don’t pay for it later.

Here are some key insights from this month’s discussion:

How can Cybercriminals Steal Your Dealership’s Data?

Cybercriminals use many different types of attacks to attempt to steal vital information from your dealership. Including:

• Social engineering with a legitimate looking phishing email
• A fake login page to steal an employee’s login information
• Online scams aimed at tricking people into giving banking details
• Ransomware attacks target a dealer’s important data and hold it hostage for a fee.

• Now more than ever compliance is crucial as there has been a 72% increase in data breaches between 2021 and 2023 and the cost of cybercrime is estimated to reach $23.8 trillion USD by 2027, demonstrating the detrimental effect it has on innocent third parties.

• Ultimately meeting compliance standards set by the FTC helps ensure your dealership can stay secure and minimize risk wherever possible.

Why Should Compliance be Your Concern?

• Compliance is crucial because it includes best practices to protect not just your business, but your customers who trust you with their personal information, such as names, payment info, addresses and other sensitive data.

• Additionally, your dealership has significant cashflow, whether it be general banking, the selling and financing of goods, or payroll. It’s in everyone’s best interest to protect the assets and banking data of your dealership.

• Finally, cybercriminals are more likely to target dealers, not just for their funds, but for money from large insurance providers. Dealers with fraud insurance can become a “soft target” for payouts from large insurance companies.

How can you protect your dealership?

1. Training and educating employees on the most common kinds of attacks is crucial as social engineering is the most common way cybercriminals infiltrate dealerships
2. Regular patching and updates ensure your system is protected from the most recent security vulnerabilities.
3. Firewalls, and antivirus can help protect your network and workstations against hackers trying to brute force their way into your dealership’s network.

About the Dealership Insights Forum

The Dealership Insights Forum is a monthly meeting with fellow dealers to discuss market trends, share best practices, and gain insight into how other dealers are running their day-to-day operations.

See when our next meeting is here.