Data breaches can impact your entire business
When Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified before the House Energy and Commerce and Senate Commerce committees about missteps related to his company’s infamous cybersecurity breach, one member of Congress noticed the social media founder’s failure to acknowledge the potential negative impact the breach could have on small businesses.
Since U.S. Rep. Nydia M. Velázquez, D-N.Y., isn’t a member of one of the committees that questioned Zuckerberg, she expressed her concern in a letter that read: “If small firms’ customer data was compromised, those companies’ brands—through no fault of their own—may be permanently damaged. Facebook must be held accountable to the Main Street small businesses who trusted them,” ACA International Vice President of Communications Kim Coghill reports in the August issue of Collector magazine.
A quick recap of the Facebook breach: Cambridge Analytica used an app to illegitimately access the personal information of approximately 87 million Facebook users, including 71 million Americans. Zuckerberg was called to Washington to testify in reference to the incident and about the social media giant’s policies and procedures around data security.
Velázquez noted in her letter that most small businesses do not have the staff or financial resources to become experts in cybersecurity, nor do they have the ability to identify whether their customers were impacted by the Facebook breach. So, as the ranking member of the House Committee on Small Business, she asked Zuckerberg to provide insight as to what Facebook is doing to educate small businesses about the breach and what type of analysis has—or will—be conducted on the social media giant’s policies and systems to ensure this type of incident doesn’t occur in the future.
While Velázquez’s questions have yet to be fully answered, one important lesson we can take away from the Facebook debacle is to carefully read privacy policies and terms of use before clicking “agree” when signing onto any app, social media channel or website. This is especially true for small businesses trying to compete in a fast-paced world that relies heavily on social media and other high-tech internet applications.
The Weak Link
Data security, or the lack of it, can be extremely expensive, according to Verizon’s 2018 Data Breach Investigations Report.
And just as important, data breaches aren’t just a problem for security professionals.
The report noted: “The impact is felt across the whole business—from your legal team, embroiled in litigation, to your front line employees, who can’t access the tools they need to do their jobs. Everyone needs to play their part in managing the risks.”
The Verizon report, based on the analysis of more than 53,000 real-world incidents, revealed what you probably already suspect: 76 percent of data breaches were financially motivated and almost 73 percent of cyberattacks occurred at the hands of outsiders. This means that about 28 percent of these breaches didn’t involve unknown hackers, but rather company insiders.
Before you start looking over your staff’s shoulders, remember that “malicious employees looking to line their pockets aren’t the only insider threats you face,” according to Verizon.
Oftentimes, the problem is the result of innocent errors, totaling about 17 percent of the breaches in Verizon’s study. Missteps can include failing to shred confidential information, sending an email to the wrong person, losing a laptop or misconfiguring web servers, Coghill reports.
Additionally, not all employees feel empowered to report data privacy and security incidents.
Back in Washington, leaders continue to debate legislative proposals to help resolve issues that plague American consumers when they make purchases, use mobile payment technologies or log on their computers at home or at work.
ACA International will continue to engage with Congress about this issue and report on data security-related legislation and regulatory agency actions that impact our members.
Read Coghill’s complete report on data security in the August issue of Collector magazine.
To learn more about data security breaches and how to minimize risk at your company, register for ACA International’s CORE: Data Security & Privacy (2-Day) Sept. 5-6 with Leslie Bender, IFCCE, chief strategy officer and general counsel at BCA Financial Services Inc. in Miami.
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