An astonishing six in every ten businesses have suffered a data breach in the last three years.
Bitdefender (https://www.techradar.com/news/data-breaches-hitting-more-companies-than-ever )carried out research of more than 6,000 cybersecurity professionals from across the UK, US, Australia, New Zealand, Germany, France, Italy and Spain to compile its global Hacked Off! study.
They found that:
- 90% of data breaches are caused by human error
- Over half of businesses have suffered a data breach
- And CISOs believe data breach experience makes them more employable
Bitdefender found that infosec professionals are well aware of the risks their organizations face.
More than half (58%) worried about organizational readiness in the face of a global cyberattack and 49% said they are even losing sleep over it.
More than a third of respondents report a lack of cybersecurity understanding from general employees.
And 57% of the infosec professionals surveyed said that key executives are the least likely to comply with organizational cybersecurity policy as they either push back on or completely disregard the rules.
Stress
Stress levels among infosec professionals remain high as they continue to suffer from breach fatigue.
A whopping 49% of infosec professionals said their team has experienced both alert and agent fatigue.
Their worry is compounded by the belief that 73% of respondents think their organization is more at risk of a cyberattack because they are under-resourced.
This figure is even higher (78%) for respondents at companies which employ over 1,000 people.
Almost one in three of respondents (29%) revealed that it would take a week or longer to detect an advanced cyberattack and only three in every one hundred reported that 100% of advanced attacks can efficiently detected and isolated.
The research also found that problems arising from being unaware of an on-going breach include business interruption (43%) and reputational cost (38%) and a loss of revenue (37%).
More than a third of respondents (37%) say the loss of customer trust is their biggest concern.
Study findings
Global cybersecurity researcher at Bitdefender, Liviu Arsene provided further insight on the study’s findings, said: “Poor cybersecurity is an undeniable threat to businesses today. From the loss of customer trust to the impact on the bottom line it is critical for infosec professionals to get it right.
“Our advice would be to focus on critical areas of improvement. The Hacked Off! Study reveals that infosec professionals believe that the main drivers for boosting their organizations’ cybersecurity profiles are improving data protection, and faster detection and response capabilities.
“In addition, respondents suggest investments also need to be made into more effective ways of detecting cyber threats, with ‘network traffic analysis’, and anti-malware technology topping the list.
“And interestingly, they reveal EDR should not be discounted, with seven in ten infosec professionals believing that EDR can help prevent future attacks.”
