Big data, big risk

Along with the aforementioned “direct costs” of a data breach – almost $1 million – those executives also factor in extra expenses to cover remediation costs would include legal fees, compensation to customers, third party resources and fines or compliance costs, along with public relations and communications plus compensation to any affected suppliers and employees.

On top of all that, those executives predict that companies suffering a data breach of some kind would also witness a 13% drop in revenue as a result.

Hoo boy.

“This report makes it clearer than ever how critically important it is for organizations to implement a comprehensive solution to protect their data,” noted Christopher Camejo, NTT’s director of threat and vulnerability analysis, in the report. “The devastating cost of a data breach cannot be overstated, and as this report shows, many organizations simply are vulnerable.”

Here are some other findings from this particular study:

• Some 65% of business decision makers polled expect to suffer an information security breach.
• Almost all respondents say they would suffer external and internal impacts if data was stolen in a security breach, including loss of customer confidence (69%) and damage to reputation (60%).
• One third of business decision makers also expects to resign or expects another senior colleague to resign as a result of a breach.
• While 54% of those surveyed say information security is “vital” to their business and nearly a fifth (18%) agree that poor information security is the “single greatest risk,” just two-thirds (65%) predict that their organization will suffer a data breach sometime in the future.

Ouch. Let’s hope trucking companies figure out ways to circle the digital wagons to prevent getting socked in the data gut.