Cyber Risk Today – Feb 11, 2021
A huge thank you to Rob McFarlane and Rob Selnes from CapriCMW for a very informative and thought-provoking presentation on identifying and mitigating cyber risks. CapriCMW is a risk management and insurance firm, with 13 offices in BC and across the country.
Business productivity is increasingly reliant on technology. With the onset of COVID-19 and organizations’ IT being stretched farther than ever before, this presents accelerated risks for cyber security, due to employees using their own devices, working from home etc. Cyber criminals are increasingly targeting your employees due to less security, and using the employee as the conduit into the organization’s IT system.
Rob S. shared some very interesting statistics in the presentation:
- Canada has 3rd highest number of cyber breaches in the world
- Cyber breaches cost Canadian organizations over $3 billion in 2018
- On average it took 181 days for a breach to be identified and 69 days to contain it
- Cybercrime has now surpassed illegal drug trafficking as a criminal moneymaker
- Ransomware attack costs for Canadian businesses are now averaging $1 million per incident
- In Canada, the two most common cyber-attacks are ransomware attacks and e-theft by imposters
70% of all cyber incidents are caused by employee error, curiosity and /or insufficient IT security training, such as: Ransomware attacks, e-theft of funds by imposters (by email or calling companies), targeted scams, hacking attacks. Letting a cybercriminal into an organization’s system can be as simple as one employee opening a website or clicking on an email.
What can you do to prevent this from happening in your organization? Identify and prioritize your cyber risks. Develop an internal culture of cyber risk awareness. Security awareness training for employees. Test your systems. Invest in strong IT. Have an incident response plan, a business continuity plan and obtain cyber insurance.
