It's not unexpected any more: We awaken to learn that yet another national retailer has been hacked, and once again credit-card information for millions of customers is at risk.
Yet, despite all the publicity these security breaches receive and all the warnings consumers hear, cyber criminals still achieve success — and they're becoming more brazen than ever.
Sometimes it can feel like the cyber criminals are working harder than the people who are supposed to be protecting our information, but when consumers and businesses are vigilant, they can foil those cyber criminals despite all their scheming.
We should be asking ourselves: Why not prevent breaches instead of reacting to them? Corporate America and consumers don't need to sit around waiting to become cybercrime victims.
Related: Threat of cyber attack is biggest fear for businesses, global study finds
To that end, here are some cyber security trends and factors worth knowing about for the rest of 2017 and beyond:
(Photo: iStock)
Serious breaches still take too long to discover
As unsettling as it is to think about, the truth is there's generally a long lag time between when a breach happens and when it's discovered. The average is 280 days, which means if cyber criminals hack your system today, it could be about nine months before anyone realizes there's a problem.
Employees will continue to be critical to protection
For just about any organization, employees are the first line of defense — and the weakest link. Typically, when a breach happens behind a firewall it's because someone was tricked into clicking on a link they shouldn't have. Employees need to be educated to prevent these kinds of attacks.
Related: Cyber-breach communications plans: What insurance professionals (and clients) need to know
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