Given the cost to both companies and customers, it's critical that IT teams develop a solid strategy utilizing the most effective tools available to help avoid a breach.

Editor's Note: This article is an extract of the white paper "Defending Against Data Breach: Developing the Right Encryption Strategy" available for free download from the MC White Paper Center.

No matter how secure your information systems appear, and no matter how confident your IT staff may be, the risks of your company experiencing a data breach are real, and they continue to grow daily.

Information security breaches cost companies millions of dollars each year, and incidents continue to rise. While government and industry regulations have been implemented that penalize the company if their sensitive data is compromised, protecting against the threat of data breach is difficult. Take, for example, the multiple ways unauthorized access can occur: theft of portable devices, lost paper files and external storage devices, improper access by employees, network infiltration from outside entities, and more.

Data breach incidents are not a temporary statistical aberration, but instead represent a growing epidemic. Given the cost to both companies and their customers, it's critical that IT teams develop a solid strategy that utilizes the most effective tools.

This article and associated white paper have several objectives:

• Examine the problems that create a higher risk for data breach
• Explore the regulatory landscape
• Describe the technical hurdles facing both management and IT
• Demonstrate how the right data encryption technologies can reduce the exposure of data theft without hampering efficient work flow

Most importantly, this article and white paper offer recommendations for how IT management can deploy strong security technologies to encrypt, monitor, and audit the access and use of sensitive information within an organization's systems.

Data Breaches Wreak Havoc

According to the most recent estimates published by the Ponemon Institute's 2010 Annual Study, "U.S. Cost of Data Breach," the average corporation that suffers a data breach will pay $7.2 million to resolve the issue. That's about $214 per record to cover legal fees, the cost of notifying each affected person, regulatory fines, lost employee productivity, stock price dips, and indirect customer losses.

To learn more, download the white paper "Defending Against Data Breach:

Developing the Right Encryption Strategy" available for free download from the MC White Paper Center.

Thomas M. Stockwell is an independent IT analyst and writer. He is the former Editor in Chief of MC Press Online and Midrange Computing magazine and has over 20 years of experience as a programmer, systems engineer, IT director, industry analyst, author, speaker, consultant, and editor.  

 

Tom works from his home in the Napa Valley in California. He can be reached at ITincendiary.com.