Ponemon

The second annual study on data breach preparedness was released by the Ponemon Institute on September 24, and the study indicates that the number of companies that have had a data breach is on the rise.

Ponemon Institute conducts independent research on privacy, data protection, and information security policy.  For the September 2014 study, Is Your Company Ready for a Big Data Breach?, Ponemon Institute surveyed 567 U.S. executives from organizations ranging in size from less than 500 to more than 75,000 employees about how prepared they think their companies are to respond to a data breach.

It appears that for an overwhelming number of the study’s participants, the answer to “Is your company ready for a big data breach?” is, unfortunately, “No.”Continue Reading Ponemon Institute Releases Second Annual Study on Data Breach Preparedness

The costs associated with a data security breach can be substantial.   In addition to addressing the security issue that gave rise to the breach, companies often must assess notice obligations under federal and state law, manage public relations challenges, and work to rebuild consumer trust.   The costs–in terms of time and resources–needed to accomplish these

According to the annual Ponemon Institute survey report released March 8, 2011 in 2010, U.S. companies affected by data breaches incurred an average cost of $7.2 million per incident.  (In comparison, in 2009, companies reported an average cost of $6.75 million).  The Ponemon survey identified a number of other interesting trends:

  • Companies are responding to data