Action1 Corporation, provider of the #1 secure and easy-to-use remote monitoring and management (RMM) cloud platform, today released its 2022 SMB IT Security Needs Report. The study analyzes the cybersecurity challenges of small and midsize businesses (SMBs) and their relationships with managed service providers (MSPs) amidst today's macroeconomic crisis. The report polled 750 SMBs worldwide.

96% of SMBs outsource at least some of their IT security to MSPs, and nearly 1 in 4 (23%) are looking to replace their current provider. The most serious frustration is interruptions to business processes: 48% of respondents complained about performance issues with devices — and this problem was the top factor that would lead them to change MSPs. Another big issue was outages or unplanned system reboots, reported by 33% of respondents.

When choosing a new MSP, the top factor for SMBs is a comprehensive security offering. To understand how MSPs can strengthen their security offerings, the report examines the cybersecurity challenges of SMBs in depth. The first key finding is that SMBs fail to assess their risk adequately: 63% of respondents think their SMB is at less cyber risk than large enterprises, but in fact, 81% of the SMBs surveyed experienced at least one security incident during the preceding 12 months. Second, the types of attacks that SMBs most commonly experienced were ransomware, password-based attacks, and phishing, and the top root causes of these incidents were employees falling prey to phishing (63%) and unpatched systems (43%).

These insights indicate that MSPs can attract and retain SMB customers by helping them assess their IT risks more accurately and implement vital security controls, including robust patch management and timely software updates, effective password policies, an up-to-date antivirus, backups, and employee cybersecurity awareness training.

"The severity of the cybersecurity landscape and lack of SMB preparedness represent a big opportunity for MSPs," said Alex Vovk, CEO and Co-Founder of Action1. "To seize it, they need to provide all the services SMBs need, faster and at higher quality, by using modern technologies that enable them to automate their IT routines; perform key tasks like patch management without interrupting the client's business processes; and manage client endpoints effectively to ensure both performance and security."