The Cost of a Breach- How to Mitigate by Creating Human Firewalls, with Karen Clark.

It’s no secret that the ongoing circumstances our society face, are highlighting the priority of your company’s cybersecurity. While hearing security warnings and determining steps to take in protecting your business, are you considering the reality of the cost of a breach? In part 3 of CEO Paul Sponcia’s discussion with expert Karen Clark, we talked about the cost a data breach has on your business and how to mitigate by creating human firewalls within your organization.

As a business owner, evaluating all the different security services and products available to you can be overwhelming. There are a lot of options and the truth is- security can be expensive. Many companies find themselves asking “do we really need to spend this amount of money on security? What are the chances a breach happens to us?”

Karen shared an example of the cost a breach can have on your company that really put the value of spending money on security in perspective. While working for an organization, she too found board members asking if it was really necessary to spend a significant amount of money on their security.

The organization she worked for had roughly 866,850  records in their database. Based on the OCR guidelines they were required to notify every patient by mail if their patient database experienced a breach. In order to notify their patients this means they would spend over $400,000 in postage alone. And that’s before they would even get started on fixing the problem itself.

The black and white answer is that spending money to heighten your business’s security on the front end, pales in comparison to what it will cost you if you experience a breach.

8-10 years ago, the prospect of being compromised felt like something that only happened to other people. But the reality is today, that’s not the case. Almost everyone reading this is likely to have been compromised themselves or know someone who has been. It’s no longer a small percentage of people breaches are happening to. Taking the risk of not implementing proper security measures to save money, is not a gamble you want to take.

While finding the best fit security measures for your company, continue to raise employee awareness. The saying is true- “the best firewall is the end user, your employees.”

Talk to your employees. Make the reality personal. Connect the truth of cybersecurity concerns to how it can happen to and affect your employees, your company and the people you do business with.  The reality of how it can happen to you will get the attention of employees much more than a generalized warning.

At The IT Company, we deploy a powerful tool for our customers- KnowBe4. During the current crisis, KnowBe4 has offered a free home security session to help educate employees- giving specific examples of what a phishing email looks like and verbiage that hackers may use. We highly encourage taking your employees through this security.

The IT Company wants your business to experience the best success and outcomes possible for your business. We are dedicated to providing IT services that help you obtain the outcomes you desire. For more information on how we can end your IT frustrations- contact us!

Watch Paul and Karen's interview!

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