Big and small business are vulnerable to cybercrime. Many small businesses frequently do not have the budget necessary to protect their data from a cyber attack, thus making them more vulnerable. For many small businesses the financial hardship they endure due to this crime leaves them unable to recover for many years, setting back their business and profits for the near future.
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Hacked! Business bank accounts vulnerable to cybercriminals
It’s a chilling moment when a small business owner discovers hackers have stolen thousands of dollars from the company checking account.
Cybercriminals took an average of $32,000 from small business accounts, according to a December survey of owners by the advocacy group National Small Business Association. And businesses don’t have the same legal protection from bank account fraud consumers have.
The Electronic Funds Transfer Act, passed in 1978, states that it’s intended to protect individual consumers from bank account theft, but makes no mention of businesses. Whether a business is protected depends on the agreement it signs with a bank, says Doug Johnson, a senior vice president with the American Bankers Association, an industry group. If the business hasn’t complied with any security measures required by the agreement, it could be liable for the stolen money, he says.
Businesses fail to prepare as cybercrime surges globally
Cybercrime is now the second most reported economic crime and has affected at least a third of organizations in the past 24 months, yet many businesses are still underprepared, a PWC report has found.
According to the Global Economic Crime Survey, cybercrime has jumped from being the 4th to 2nd most reported kind of economic crime, behind only asset misappropriation. Meanwhile, the losses associated with cybercrime are huge and growing, but an alarming number of businesses don’t have a plan in place.
The report finds that only 37% of organizations have a cyber incident response plan, despite the fact that 61% of CEOs said they were concerned about cybersecurity. This backs up the findings from last week’s RSA Conference report, which found just one in seven security chiefs report directly to their CEO, despite rising concern within their businesses.
Around 50 respondents to the PWC survey said they had lost in excess of $5 million, while a third of these said the figure was greater than $100 million. According to the Wall Street Journal, the percentage of companies reporting losses of more than $1 million as a result of cybercrime attacks doubled since 2014.
Chris McCarty: Protect big, little data against cybercrime
You probably know about the big breaches. JP Morgan Chase. Home Depot. Target. Maybe you even read a few of those juicy emails between Sony executives bashing Angelina Jolie and Will Smith. I can imagine your reaction: “That’s crazy, but what’re the chances it happens to me or my little company?”
The chances are much greater than you think. In November, during a data breach and privacy law program in Chicago, I attended a session presented by Wesley Hsu, the executive assistant U.S. attorney who headed up the Sony investigation. Here a few statistics provided by Mr. Hsu that should open the eyes of anyone in business:
Every day, there are twice as many cybercrime victims as newborn babies;
There are 50,000 new victims each hour, 820 new victims each minute and 14 new victims each second;
The total number of estimated cybercrime victims over the past year is greater than the combined populations of the United States and Canada.
