304 Data Loss Incidents in 2014 according to Data Loss Prevention Source
Posted by skyhighnetworks on June 2nd, 2014
When a physician at Columbia University used a personally-owned computer on a shared network to store patient records, the records were stolen. His employer Columbia and New York-Presbyterian Hospital recently paid a $4.8 million settlement for the breach. “What you’re seeing is the impact of legislation we passed over a decade ago continuing to bite,” says attorney Gerard Franzione. Given the pace of technological change, he says you can expect more data breaches and fines.
According to the Open Security Foundation, so far in 2014 there have been 304 data loss events publicly disclosed, like the one at Columbia University. That’s more incidents in 5 months than all the incidents in the entire year of 2005. Given the enormous increase in these incidents, what data loss prevention steps are companies taking? Technology analyst firm Redwood Advisors says companies need to take a holistic look at their technology usage and implement DLP best practices.
“There’s a generation of data loss prevention software deployed a decade ago that has never been extended to how people work today,” says analyst Stephanie Newman. What’s needed, he says, is an alignment with the tools employees are using today including cloud services. “Most companies have no visibility into what data employees are putting into cloud services, and the security controls applied to that data. They need to start with what’s happening before they can secure it.”
Recent reports show that the average company uses 759 cloud services, and that the number of cloud services they use grows 20% quarter over quarter. At that rate, their cloud usage approximately doubles every year. Meanwhile, IT estimates that there are around 50 cloud services in use by employees, meaning the actual number is more than 10x what the CIO expects to find. Gartner sees a new category of data loss prevention tools focused on the cloud and sees this as a potential investment.
Author :
Skyhigh Networks, the Cloud Security Services company, enables companies to embrace Cloud Security Services with appropriate levels of security, compliance, and governance while lowering overall risk and cost. With customers in financial services, healthcare, high technology, media, manufacturing, and legal verticals, the company was a finalist for the RSA Conference 2013 Most Innovative Company award and was recently named a "Cool Vendor" by Gartner, Inc. Headquartered in Cupertino, Calif., Skyhigh Networks is led by an experienced team and is venture-backed by Greylock Partners and Sequoia Capital. For more information, visit us at http://www.skyhighnetworks.com/cloud-data-loss-prevention/ or follow us on Twitter@skyhighnetworks.
