Don’t be the Next Victim

Even as the latest breach headline fades away, we all know there is another waiting in the wings (read Part I of my blog). How can organizations protect themselves? There is no panacea for securing a payment environment, and implementing advanced technology alone will not make an organization compliant with the Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standard (DSS). The PCI DSS provides a solid foundation for a security strategy that covers payment and other types of data, but overall security does not begin and end with PCI compliance. Therefore, an organization’s security strategy should employ best practices and an architecture that will not only facilitate PCI compliance, but also help secure the cardholder environment, prevent identity theft, reliably protect brand image and assets, mitigate financial risk, and provide a secure foundation for new business services.

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Tags: Cisco, data breach, data loss, data loss credit card, design, pci, PCI Compliance, pci-dss

Last weekend was a typical one, nothing out of the ordinary: errands, science fairs, softball practice with the kids.  However, I found myself hesitating a number of times, thinking twice, before I handed my credit card to the cashier at the mall for to purchase a pair of shoes and again as I typed in my credit card number and security code online to purchase some items for a school fund raiser.  In the past, I hadn’t given this much thought, but with yet another data breach in the news, it seems that the breaches are continuing to occur – and as consumers, we will continue getting those ‘Dear John’ letters informing us we were one of the unlucky ones…

With news of another data breach of up to 1.5 million credit and debit cards compromised last month as well as high-profile data attacks against the International Monetary Fund, National Public Radio, Google and Sony’s PlayStation Network, data security should be top of mind to all of us.  So, how are these breaches continuing despite all of the efforts to secure customer data?  In a series of blog entries to follow, we’ll outline the anatomy of a data breach, steps you can take to reduce your risk, and how Cisco can help keep your organization from being the topic of the next breach headline.

Anatomy of a Data Breach:

It used to be that hackers were in the business of hacking for fame or infamy… mostly individuals or groups of friends were doing small-time breaches, leaving digital graffiti on well-known websites. Although these breaches demonstrated security gaps among those affected, there was little financial impact compared to today.  It should come as no surprise in a world of big data, that it is harder than ever for organizations to protect their confidential information.  Complex, heterogeneous IT environments make data protection and threat response very difficult.

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Tags: compliance, credit card, data breach, data loss, malware, pci, security

These tips can protect your business and customers from financial loss and identity theft

So far this year, 369 data breaches have been reported to the Open Security Foundation Data Loss Database, affecting 126,749,634 records. A breach in your business data can come from loss, theft, or exposure of information, which opens you and your customers up to such risks as financial loss and identity theft. Most reported breaches involve stealing private information, like customers’ email addresses and credit card numbers.

A small business can suffer data loss through a variety of data breaches, not all of which can be pinned on a malicious hacker. Data can be lost when a mobile device goes missing, gets accidentally deleted from a server or computer, or when an employee inadvertently makes private data public or steals it outright. And sometimes data is lost not by human error or interference but by an unfortunate accident such as a natural disaster or computer failure. In some way and at some time, a data breach can—and eventually will—happen to everyone.

These five steps can help you secure your critical data against breaches and mitigate the risk of losing customers, intellectual property, and regulatory compliance.

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Tags: data breach, data protection, security, small business