April 22 2008
Protect your customers’ data
The Information Commissioner says companies are not doing enough to protect customers' data
According to a briefing with the BBC the Information Commissioner has said that the 94 security breaches reported to him last year was an "alarming" number.
Information Commissioner Richard Thomas said of the 94 data breaches, 62 security breaches were in the public sector, 28 were in the private sector and four in the charity or third sector, and data had been recovered in only three of the 94 cases, he said.
Thomas added "The evidence shows that more must be done to eradicate inexcusable security breaches," he said.
Mr Thomas said: "The government, banks and other organisations need to regain the public's trust by being far more careful with people's personal information. Once again I urge business and public sector leaders to make data protection a priority in their organisation."
Thomas is expected to say more at the InfoSec IT security show which starts today (22nd April), so get ready to be inundated with scare stories for the next three weeks, as the arts-degree wielding press are spoon-fed scare stories by security companies about how the web is full of nothing but criminals, and absolutely everyone is vulnerable, and you’re generally asking for trouble if you so much as click on Facebook. Which sounds cynical but looking at the figures (see confidential data at risk) I think we’re vindicated in our cynicism. Yes there’s a lot of crime out there but in general successful breaches are getting rarer as we all crank up the spending and more and more users are aware of the threats.
