What are the risks

This year’s Cyber Security Breaches Survey contained a startling quote, one which is enough to extinguish the merest hint of complacency among those responsible for maintaining and securing private and public IT infrastructures.

Prepared by the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology (DSIT), the authors of the annual review reported:
“We estimate that UK businesses have experienced approximately 7.78 million cyber crimes of all types and approximately 116,000 non-phishing cyber crimes in the last 12 months.”

The survey also noted that one in two of all businesses had experienced some sort of cyber attack in the previous 12 months. For medium-sized businesses (the government classes those with a turnover of between £25-250 million as mid-sized) the figure rose to 70% and large ones higher still, at 74%.

The government itself is alive to cyber threats to our national infrastructure and economy. A Cyber Security & Resilience Bill was among the first pieces of proposed legislation to be unveiled in the King’s Speech. Due to be enacted next year, it is designed to extend legal oversight to more digital services and supply chains. In discussing the need for such legislation the DSIT specifically cites June’s ransomware attack on London hospitals, a breach which not only led to the delay or cancellation of appointments and operations, but the release of sensitive datawhich one analysis suggests affected nearly one million patients.

Incidentally, that number was calculated by CaseMatrix, a company which specialises in identifying, for legal firms, “potential class action cases arising from cyber incidents and data breaches.” Where there’s blame…

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