Study: cost of data breaches increasing
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
An annual report has found that companies who experienced a data breach last year reported its average total cost of the attack was more than $6.6 million per breach, a slight increase from the year before.
In 2007, the average cost was $6.3 million, making the current number an increase of 2.5 percent, according to the fourth Ponemon Institute study that was released yesterday.
The study examined a total of 43 U.S. companies that suffered security breaches last year and also found lost business from the experience made up approximately 70 percent of the costs, which is an increase of 54 percent from two years ago.
For the affected companies, the average rate of churn, the rate by which customers cease doing business with the firm, was 3.6 percent. The most susceptible to security breaches were financial services firms and health care organizations, which experienced churn rates of 5.5 percent and 6.5 percent respectively.
According to the study, companies said they would institute measures such as encryption, identity and access management to reduce the threat of security breaches.
Some companies have also employed the use of email archiving as a way to increase security and improve disaster recovery.
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