Did you hear about the recent data breach that exposed 16 billion passwords for logins, including social media accounts, virtual private networks, and corporate tools? While the breach is bad, yes, the truth of the matter is that the situation may be misleading, at least on the surface.
Let’s take a look at why and learn a few lessons in the process.
Cybernews, the outlet that originally covered this story, has been tracking numerous datasets of breached credentials all throughout this year. Some of these datasets contained tens of millions of credentials, while others reached up to 3.5 billion. The figure actually represents the total impact of those breaches when they are combined.
Much of this is old news in the first place, too, as much of this data is from years ago. Plus, some of it overlaps, which means that it’s not entirely accurate.
It’s one thing to increase awareness of a problem and another entirely to sensationalize old news.
Yes, 16 billion passwords, sans duplicates, were stolen at some point, which suggests that security practices could be improved. But when you lump them all together, it gives the impression that cybersecurity efforts are meaningless, as they’ll just get stolen anyway. That message doesn’t help anyone, and it doesn’t do anything to solve the problem.
These exaggerations also undermine the trust people have in reporting agencies; when data breaches happen all the time, it becomes the norm, which is not the mindset we need people to approach cybersecurity with.
Data leaks could have significant impacts on businesses and organizations, including the following:
Data breaches cost your business money. You have to investigate the cause of the breach, figure out how it occurred, and notify your clients or anyone else involved. You can expect legal fees as well, as you’ll likely get fined by a regulatory body.
It’s not a good look when your business suffers a data breach. Clients won’t trust you anymore, and new customers will be hesitant to sign on if they don’t feel like they can trust you with their data.
You can expect downtime and other challenges to productivity when you’re experiencing a data breach, especially when remediation and recovery efforts are involved.
Certain industries are subject to regulatory bodies that govern how data should be handled. If you fail to adhere to security standards expected of your chosen industry, you can expect to be slapped with fines and other types of legal action.
Your customers will be affected by a data breach as well, depending on how much data was involved. They could have their personal information stolen, their accounts taken over, or become the target of phishing and social engineering attacks.
Want to keep your business safe from data breaches? Here’s what you can do on both the organizational level and the individual level:
On the Organizational Level:
On the Individual Level:
Suffolk Computer Consultants might not be able to do much about the way other companies and services handle your data, but we can ensure that you’re doing all you can to protect your in-house resources. Call us today at 631-905-9617 to learn more.
About the author
Suffolk Computer Consultants has been serving the Speonk area since 2013, providing IT Support such as technical helpdesk support, computer support, and consulting to small and medium-sized businesses.
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