UK SMEs face over 65,000 cybersecurity breaches daily, states report
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New report by Robert Walters and data provider Vacancysoft titled Cybersecurity:Building Business Resilience has revealed that the cost of data breaches to UK companies have reached around £2.48 million per instance. UK SMEs are currently at a risk of 65,000 cyber security attacks daily, with around 4,500 of these being successful. The numbers have been increasing and could be much higher since the beginning of the pandemic.
The report showed that around 44% of the consumers will stop using a company online if they were the victim of a cyber attack. This targets the retail and service operators who have enhanced their digital operations in the light of the lockdown. Ecommerce transactions have shown an increase of 168% and is currently occupying 27.5% of total retail sales this year. With the rising transactions and retail sales, the need for companies to put security at the centre has increased.
Darius Goodarzi, Principal – Information Security and IT Risk at Robert Walters, commented, “Cyber-attacks rose to an all-time high in the last few years causing a great deal of media attention. As the general public became increasingly aware of personal data and privacy issues – including the introduction of GDPR – cyber security increasingly became a ‘differentiator’ for brands in a market where customers demand more transparency.”
“The tech industry has set the tone, with brands such as Apple and Whatsapp putting security at the centre of their marketing message. For e-commerce, on the other hand, the pace at which the sector grew during Covid-19 raises questions as to whether their cyber security has been up to par with the sharp increase in traffic to online sites.With consumers being hyper-sensitive about their personal information in a rapidly evolving digital world, e-commerce sites cannot afford to lose the trust of customers in what is becoming a very competitive space.”
With the lockdown measures in place, the report revealed that little consideration was given by the government to the vulnerability of IT & Cloud security when businesses were told they must enforce remote working. 48% of the companies stated that they do not have adequate cybersecurity provision to maintain a 100% remote working model.
For stepping up the security game, it is predicted that the current £68 billion spend on cybersecurity will need to be doubled, for complementing the new ways of working.
ALSO, READ: Cybersecurity in Financial Services Report 2020 by IBS Intelligence
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