As the world marks Data Privacy Day (January 28), cases of system infiltration and data breaches remain a worrying trend as unprepared organizations continue to fall victim leading to catastrophic losses. Mooted to raise awareness and promote privacy and data protection best practices, Data Privacy Day serves as a reminder of the need for organizations to prioritize data protection.
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We sought insights from industry experts on the importance of this day and this is what they had to say:
“As we commemorate Data Privacy Day, data protection remains a hot topic – one that needs a collective approach towards reducing data breaches and cyber-attacks. As the world becomes more dependent on data, scores of organizations are increasingly becoming targets with some falling victim to breaches worth millions of dollars.
Some of the most recent data breach cases occur after cyber attackers gain access through an API. This is a trend that has emerged even as more companies increasingly shift their data management strategy to primarily used cloud storage and applications. As organizations integrate cloud2cloud interconnections, complexity in deployment continues to grow as well.
This is because most companies still need to be equipped to deal with imminent cyber-attacks thanks to misconfigured on insufficient protection for their APIs.
A crucial point worth raising is that ransomware has already shifted to stealing and exfiltrating data in recent years. Attackers know that having this data and threatening to release it can be more devastating than encryption, which can be fought with backups.
The most effective way to deal with such threats is adopting a holistic view and a solution like data loss prevention, which can significantly help potential targets mitigate the risks.
Passwords remain the number one defense when it comes to protecting data. As an authentication mechanism, a strong password is what stands between an organization’s valuable data and millions of dollars in losses, not to mention a bad reputation. Sadly,
we still see many companies with authentications (aka passwords like 123456) and no multi-factor authentication applied. This is a disaster waiting to happen!” –
Candid Wuest, VP of Cyber Protection Research at Acronis
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“To ensure that data privacy becomes a common practice, business leaders must first and foremost define their data strategy. It is essential to have a plan which outlines how data is managed, especially in a hybrid cloud environment.
Key among its top consideration should also be how the organisation plans to implement a ‘privacy-by-design’ approach into their overall data strategy.”-
Wim Stoop, Senior Director at Cloudera