The unending stream of bad news about data breaches shows no sign of abating, noted DBTA columnist and Unisphere Research analyst Joe McKendrick, in a recent article, pointing to a raft of breaches far and wide involving organizations such as health insurance companies, businesses, government agencies, and the military.
The average consolidated cost of a data breach grew to $4 million in 2016, while the average cost for each lost or stolen record containing sensitive and confidential information reached $158, according to IBM’s 2016 annual cost of a data breach study.
What’s necessary, says McKendrick, is a holistic approach that spans automation, encryption, and identity management. And, he adds, having a predefined business continuity management process in place that can be deployed in the event of a breach is critical.
Indeed, digital transformation is causing IT and security leaders to reevaluate security strategies as well as budget considerations, according to industry research.
In addition,issues relating to data sovereignty are weighing heavily on organizations, particularly in light of new regulations such as the EU’s GDPR which is due to take effect in 2018. Compliance remains the primary reason for spending on data security (44%) followed by concerns about implementing security best practices, (38%). Encryption is the top choice to satisfy data privacy regulation, while tokenization comes in as second, according to the 2017 Thales Data Threat Report, Global Edition.
With this greater appreciation for the fact that shielding sensitive data from criminals, hackers, and other prying eyes is a critical aspect of providing security for modern systems and applications, DBTA columnist Craig S. Mullins, points out that database management systems have gained more security features over the past few years and will continue to do so.
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