BREAKING: Another SOC 2 certified company just suffered a massive data breach. Shocked? You shouldn't be. While they were busy documenting their security procedures in triplicate, hackers walked through the front door they forgot to lock. This is compliance theatre in action: expensive certificates that impress auditors but don't stop criminals. Today's reality check exposes why governance frameworks fail against real threats and what UK SMBs should learn from this latest security disaster

Your MSP's favourite remote access tool just got breached. Again. ConnectWise ScreenConnect, the software thousands of managed service providers use to "protect" small businesses, has been hit by yet another cyberattack—this time by suspected state-sponsored hackers. But here's the real scandal: this is the same platform that suffered critical vulnerabilities in 2024, enabling ransomware gangs to turn MSP networks into criminal infrastructure. If your IT provider is still using repeatedly compromised tools while charging you for "enterprise security," you're not getting protection—you're paying for exposure. Time to ask some very uncomfortable questions.

Your £6,000 professional printer just joined a criminal botnet. For six months, Procolored shipped malware-infected drivers that turned customer systems into cryptocurrency theft machines, netting criminals nearly $1 million in stolen Bitcoin. When YouTuber Cameron Coward tried to install the "legitimate" software, his antivirus screamed warnings. Procolored's response? "False positive."

Even after researchers found 39 infected files containing backdoors and Bitcoin stealers, the company kept denying reality until the evidence became undeniable. If you're still trusting hardware vendors without verification, you're not just naive—you're complicit in your own compromise.

Think the hackers are your biggest threat? Think again. That smiling MSP rep who promised “complete protection” might just be the reason your business is on its knees.

Ransomware rarely walks in the front door it’s invited through by lazy patching, crap backups, and a culture of "just enough" IT.

From misconfigured firewalls to fake dashboards and vendors more interested in sales than security, this is the real story of how ransomware thrives, enabled by the very people paid to stop it.

If you trust your IT supplier blindly, you might already be compromised.

A ransomware attack just crippled one of the UK’s key cold chain hauliers, leaving thousands of pounds’ worth of meat to rot before it ever reached supermarket shelves. Peter Green Chilled, who proudly promote their “bespoke IT systems,” couldn’t even keep order processing online. The result?

Spoiled stock, supply chain chaos, and radio silence from a company with £25 million in turnover and not a single cybersecurity certification.

This isn’t just an embarrassing IT failure. It’s a wake-up call. If you're still treating cybersecurity like a nice-to-have instead of a must-do, pull up a chair. Because you're not just vulnerable. You're on the menu.

You’d think ISO27001 and SOC 2 certifications mean a business is secure. But if 2023 and 2025 have shown us anything, it’s that those badges don’t stop breaches. From Capita’s data leaks to Harrods’ containment chaos, and Co-op’s app disruption to the MOVEit dominoes, governance frameworks have failed where basic cyber hygiene would have succeeded.

Cyber Essentials, often dismissed as small business fluff, turns out to be the missing frontline control in all of these high-profile failures. This article names names, unpacks the gaps, and shows why CE+ is no longer optional, it's essential.