Security and data breaches are on the rise
alt="Security Manual - Sarbanes-Oxley" vspace=3 align=right
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longDesc="Security Manual Template - Sarbanes-Oxley" height=110>When
criminals compromise financial institutions and other corporate targets, often
the victims like to keep it as quiet as possible. At least the new wave of very
public assaults shines a bright light on the poor state of security. Businesses,
government agencies, and educational institutions reported 50 percent more data
breaches in 2008 than in 2007, exposing the personal records of at least 35.7
million Americans.
The financial consequences of such breaches can be severe. Many organizations
lose customers and revenue because of the violation of trust incurred from a
breach. Due to the growing number of state privacy laws, most breaches require
that thosewhose information is compromised must be notified.Most organizations
now pay for credit monitoringservices for several years for all those impacted
by a breach these services typically cost about $100 per
person per year.
And in some cases, organizationsare subject to fines for revealing personal
information.
The lack of even elementary training is one problem. Another is that people
don’t get penalized for failure. In the vast majority of cases, neither
end-users nor IT professionals face penalties for their role in a security
disaster.
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