Data breaches are so big these days, they’re measured by records stolen in the millions and even billions! With seemingly so many happening literally every day, let’s explore some of the standout cases and aftermath that followed.
Your Data Has Been Leaked
The title says it all. At this point, it’s safe to say that various parts of your personal and private information have been leaked, held hostage by hackers, or accessed by unauthorized people. Don’t believe me? Well, if you’ve ever used popular websites and apps like Facebook, TikTok, Microsoft, Ticketmaster, Twitter (now X), and so many more, then your data is more exposed than you think.
Data leaks almost seem unavoidable now. For instance, all you have to do is take a look at the current list of cases being investigated by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights, and you’ll be bombarded with 872 pages of ongoing data breach instances! And those are only the ones directly pertaining to the US!
Source: ocrportal.hhs.gov
When perusing this list, you’ll also likely find the cause for many of these breaches to be interesting. You would think that with regulations like the GDPR, the PCI DSS, HIPAA, and others, stored user and employee data would be harder to breach. And yet nearly all of the listed leaks are caused by insecure email and network servers.
Many of these data breaches can be chalked up to simple user error, human mistakes, crafty hackers, and so on. But, unfortunately, there are also many cases of untrustworthy companies purposefully ignoring data security regulations or opting to be late adopters only because they know they stand to make more money by not following the rules and simply paying the fines afterwards. The typical “slap on the wrist” scenario.
Billion Dollar Fines
Luckily for anyone who’s not a mega-conglomerate, this original format has been rapidly replaced with actual hard-hitting consequences. To paint the scene, it’s worth looking at the graph by Information is Beautiful’ World’s Biggest Data Breach and Hacks. Here you can clearly see countless instances in the hundreds of millions of records leaked. Not to mention the multiple 1 billion + instances… looking at you, Indonesian SIM cards and Yahoo.
Source: informationisbeautiful.net
So, we know the situation is bad, but does the time finally match the crime? Well, if we look at the highest-paid regulatory fines, it becomes obvious that some companies’ irresponsible and even downright deceitful ways are finally catching up to them.
Currently, the largest GDPR fine ever issued was to Meta (Facebook) at a whopping 1.2 billion euros! The reason for this fine was Meta’s systematic, repetitive, and continuous transfer of European users’ data to the US, which goes against the regulation’s guidelines.
Now, this fine wasn’t directly issued due to a data breach, but the GDPR’s rules exist to protect user data, especially in transfer when the information is more vulnerable. And the fact that these two items are related is only further highlighted by Facebook’s 533 million records lost to data breaches!
Everyday Users
Alright, so large-scale companies are finally getting their just desserts for playing fast and loose with everyday people’s private information. And the typical response is to hit them in the only place they care about: their wallets. But what about the individuals whose information is now sitting on some shady former employee’s laptop or being ransomed off somewhere on the dark web?
And that’s when we get to the real victims of data breaches and the consequences that directly affect real people’s lives. When the average user has their private data leaked by a company they trusted, they immediately become at risk of identity theft or fraud, financial loss, a damaged credit score, and more. Just think of the emotional tolls of knowing some malicious person now knows your home address, what medical issues you deal with, how many kids you have, and so on.
It’s been estimated that as many as 1/3rd of all Americans have fallen victim to identity theft. In fact, the FBI estimates $4 billion in financial losses for these people every year! This just further highlights how serious the consequences of data breaches can be for the everyday person.
Protecting Against Data Breaches the Right Way
Another consequence we failed to touch on is how much a company loses credibility due to data breaches. How likely are you to go back to an app or website that recently leaked your credit card number? Not very likely…
There really are no winners when it comes to data breaches. The only way to avoid them is to reach full regulatory compliance as soon as possible and actually take the time to deploy the most modern data protection standards. This includes everything from training employees on data handling to introducing sensitive data discovery software.
Such tools help companies discover and remediate at-risk data, protecting both themselves and their reputation, but most importantly, their users. And that’s the kind of data security we can all live with.
