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Industries · Hospitality

IT and security for restaurants, cafés, bars and small hotels.

We keep your registers, Wi-Fi and back office working through every shift, protect the card payments you take, and help you answer the security questions your processor and insurer send.

Book a consultation Call 424.437.8173

A 15-minute call with an engineer who works with restaurants.

Trusted byOku Nori
Sound familiar?

What we hear from restaurant owners.

A restaurant runs on a tight team, thin margins and a rush that can't wait. That shapes what goes wrong with IT, and what attackers go after.

01

Nobody has time for IT during service.

When the registers or the Wi-Fi drop on a Friday night, the manager is the help desk. Online orders stop, card readers hang, and the fix is usually rebooting things until something works.

02

Staff come and go, and passwords stay.

Shared register logins, the manager code everyone knows, and the office PC with passwords on a sticky note. People who left months ago may still get into the scheduling app or the payroll site.

03

The card questionnaire is confusing.

Your payment processor asks for a yearly self-assessment for PCI DSS, the card industry's security standard. It is full of terms most owners have never heard. Many just click yes and hope that is right.

Know what you are up against

The attacks that actually hit restaurants, explained.

You don't need to know how hackers work. It helps to know what an attack looks like when it reaches you, why restaurants are a good target, and the habit that stops most of it.

01

A fake payments or POS alert

Called phishing

What it looks like

An urgent email or text says your payouts are on hold or your POS account is locked. The link opens a sign-in page that looks real. If you sign in, the attacker can change where your deposits go.

Why restaurants get hit

Owners and managers read email on their phones between tables. A message about money arriving right before service gets a fast click.

What stops most of it

Never sign in from a link in a message. Open the app or type the address yourself, and use MFA on payment and POS accounts. MFA means a second check, like a code on your phone, when someone signs in.

02

A fake support call

Someone posing as your POS or IT company

What it looks like

A friendly caller says they are from your POS company and need to “update the system”. They ask a manager to install a remote-access app or read out a code. Then they are inside.

Why restaurants get hit

Shift managers change often and want problems gone fast. Few have been told that the real vendor rarely calls out of the blue.

What stops most of it

A simple rule: nobody installs anything or shares a code for an inbound caller. Hang up and call the vendor at the number you already have.

03

Card data stolen from your network

Through the guest Wi-Fi or the office PC

What it looks like

Card readers, the POS, the office PC and the guest Wi-Fi all share one network. An attacker who gets onto any of them can try to reach the rest, including the systems that handle cards.

Why restaurants get hit

Restaurants take cards all day, and the network was often set up once, by whoever installed the internet, and never touched again.

What stops most of it

Card readers and the POS on their own network, kept apart from guest Wi-Fi and the office, with default passwords changed.

04

Ransomware on the back office

Payroll, recipes and reservations locked

What it looks like

The office PC won't open files, and a note demands payment. Payroll exports, recipes, vendor lists and invoices are stuck until you pay or restore.

Why restaurants get hit

The back-office PC is often old, shared by several managers and behind on updates. Many restaurants have no backup at all.

What stops most of it

Automatic updates, a separate login for each manager, and backups kept off site and tested.

Illustration. The company, names and addresses are made up.

Up close

What a fake payments alert looks like.

This kind of message shows up right before a busy shift, when you have the least time to think. Here is how to read it.

  1. 1The address is close, with extra words. The real company sends from tillpoint. This one adds “-payouts” to look official. Anyone can register an address like that.
  2. 2It is about your money, and it is urgent. Held deposits are a real worry for any owner, which is exactly why attackers use them.
  3. 3The clock is short. Two hours, late on a Friday. It is built so you click before you call anyone.
  4. 4It asks for your bank details. Once they have your sign-in, they can point your deposits to their own account.

The habit that stops it: never sign in from a link in a message. Open the app you already use, or call your processor at the number on your statement.

$12.5 billion

in total reported losses from internet crime in 2023, according to complaints made to the FBI. Business email compromise alone accounted for about $2.9 billion of it.

Source: FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3), 2023 Internet Crime Report.
Check your exposure

Check your exposure in 60 seconds.

Seven yes-or-no questions about how your restaurant works today. You'll see where you stand, and the three moves that would help most.

  1. 01
    Are card readers and the POS on a separate network from guest Wi-Fi?If guests and registers use the same Wi-Fi name or router settings, the answer is probably no.
  2. 02
    Do you use MFA on email, your payments account and payroll?MFA is a second check when someone signs in, like a code on their phone.
  3. 03
    Do you call to confirm before changing a supplier's bank details?Using a number you already have, not one from the email or invoice.
  4. 04
    Does every employee have their own POS login, turned off the day they leave?Including manager codes, the scheduling app and the payroll site.
  5. 05
    Do you know which PCI self-assessment your processor needs, and is yours current?It is usually called an SAQ, short for self-assessment questionnaire.
  6. 06
    Are the office PC, POS and router kept up to date?Security updates installed within weeks, not whenever someone remembers.
  7. 07
    Are your office files backed up off site, and have you tried a restore?Recipes, vendor lists, payroll exports, menus and contracts.
Nothing you click here leaves your browser.No email, no form.
IT across a restaurant's week

From open to close, and every season.

Every part of the day and the year puts different people on different systems. Pick a stage to see what tends to go wrong there and what we put in place.

Open

Deliveries arrive, invoices pile up, and the opening manager checks email on the office PC. Supplier payments start here.

What can go wrong
  • A fake invoice or bank-change email from a “supplier” gets paid with the real ones.
  • The office PC is signed in as one shared account that everyone uses.
What we set up
  • A call-back rule for any supplier bank change, and email filtering that flags outside senders.
  • Separate logins on the office PC for each manager.
Software we already support

Keep the tools you already use.

You picked your POS and apps for good reasons. We look after the network, accounts, access and backups around them, and work with each vendor's support when something on their side breaks.

ToastRestaurant POS

The network it runs on, admin logins with MFA, and employee access cleaned up when people leave.

SquarePOS and payments

Owner account protection, team permissions, and card readers on the right network.

CloverPOS and payments

Network setup, employee logins and a check on who has owner or admin rights.

OpenTableReservations

Staff logins with MFA, and removal when a host or manager leaves.

7shiftsScheduling

Manager access, and making sure former staff are removed.

GustoPayroll

MFA for admins and a rule for confirming direct deposit changes.

QuickBooksAccounting

Separate logins for each person, MFA, and a check on who can pay suppliers.

Google WorkspaceEmail, files and Drive

Sign-in protection, sharing rules for menus and recipes, and backups.

Using something else? Ask on the call, and we will tell you honestly what we can look after.

Processors and insurers

Questions your processor or insurer will ask, and the honest answers.

If you take cards, PCI DSS applies to you, usually through a yearly self-assessment your processor asks for. Cyber insurers ask many of the same questions. Here is what each one means, and how we help you answer yes and back it up.

Don Orange

We run IT and security for restaurants and hospitality teams across Southern California.

Client stories
Questions

What restaurant owners ask us.

Sources

  1. FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center, 2023 Internet Crime Report
  2. PCI Security Standards Council, PCI DSS v4.0 document library
Talk to us

Talk to an engineer who knows restaurants.

Fifteen minutes, no slides, scheduled around your service. Bring your questions, or the PCI request sitting in your inbox.

Book a consultation 424.437.8173
On the call
  1. 01We ask how your locations, registers and staff work today.
  2. 02We look at any processor or insurer questionnaire you are facing.
  3. 03You leave with the first thing to fix, in plain English.