Impact of Cyber Security: An Overview(2021)

Cyber Security is actually a vast field of discussion in the IT sector, a delicate area that needs more attention from the people but unfortunately given the least importance. The first few words that pop up mostly in the people’s mind after hearing the word ‘cyber security’ are about cyber-attacks by hackers on various international security forces and financial banks or theft of personal details of a company through bug attack. Lack of awareness and deprivation of knowledge about cybersecurity creates a more favorable situation for hackers.

With the emergence of time, cybersecurity becomes a more glaring issue related to personal and national security. Hence, everyone using the internet and dealing with the internet must be aware of the importance, need, and impact of cyber security. In this article, we will try to throw light on the impact of cyber security.

Introduction

Cyber Security aims to protect and secure information from various aspects, including social, political or individual. Cyber-attacks seem to be holding a stronger grip over the world with the time passing by, and the recent incidents of data breaches and ransomware despite cybersecurity raises a serious alarm over the years. According to research by the department for digital, culture, media & sports, around 66% of medium-sized businesses have identified security breach over the past years. Among 50% needed new prevention method and additional staff time to deal with breaches.

In this article let us look at:

1. Ransomware Attacks
2. Data Breaches
3. Cost of Cyber Crimes

1. Ransomware Attacks

Ransomware attacks first come to light in the year 2012 for the first time. Talking about the impact of cyber security on business, the first thing that came to mind, are two famous ransomware WannaCry and Not Petya which uses Eternal Blue exploit tool to damage 300,000 windows machines leaving victims to pay $300 to $600 as Ransome amount with an estimated data loss worth 19 million euros, according to the department of health and social care. NotPetya strike of 2017 created more hue and cry among the people leaving its impact of cyber security on society by hitting numerous large organizations throughout the world.

A few of them were Maersk and FedEx whose data have been shared publicly showing a loss to that organization worth $250-$300 million. In 2015, a notable ransomware TeslaCrypt encrypted various file extensions linking to various online games leaving impact Minecraft hacks as encrypted for customers. 

2. Data Breaches

For understanding Data breach, we will study data breach statistics by year. Mostly Data breaches almost 89% happening in 2015 had occurred for earning financial benefits. 

Beginning in 2014 for the 1^st time and one of the historic data breach year causing eBay, a business tycoon worldwide, compromising with its 145 million user’s personal data and a major loss in their annual target reduction by $200 annually. In the same year, JP Morgan Chase and Home Depot, who spends almost $250 million on their cybersecurity, also lose $76 million to small businesses and households.

In 2016, Uber, a cab service provider, faces its biggest data breach affecting more than 57 million customers. The company paid a ransom of $100,000 to hackers. Toyota, another victim of the impact of cyber security in Japan, lose the personal data of more than 3.1 million customers losing its stronghold over the market.

Whether it is a big corporate firm or a worldwide popular IT services providing leading company and others who boast of their strong cybersecurity programming, cannot themselves escape from the clutch of these hackers. For instance, in 2018, Google disclosed the potential data leak, which impacts more than 500,000 million users data on the verge of selling on the dark web. 

3. Cost of Cyber Crimes

The average cost of a security breach for a medium-size business is over 3000 pounds and 19,000 pounds for a large-sized business. However, the cost is actually much greater because other than financial, and there is a separate cost of loss of data and business, customers’ reliability also decreases. They do not trust the organization anymore and end with the deal-breakers. Thereby, one faces not only monetary short-term effects but also long-term confidence and reputation repudiation effects. As per the journal of cybersecurity impact factor, the cost of data breaches will increase up to $2.1 trillion globally by 2019, which means an increase of 52% overall from the previous year. Cyber-crimes have become the most reliable source of income for Individual hackers, paying them approximately $30,000 on average. 

Conclusion

Organizations and leaders have to take cyber security seriously and develop a new department for cybersecurity in a new business. That department must be well trained to understand the weak points and potential benefits of the company and important strategies to deal with cyber-attacks. There is an equal social impact on cyber security, as there is a financial impact. Hence, learning from the past attacks, ransomware and data breaches will be the key to success and bringing a new revolution in the field of cybersecurity throughout the world. It can only be achieved with mutual participation by the people at large.

So, have you made up your mind to make a career in Cyber Security? Visit our Master Certificate in Cyber Security (Red Team) for further help. It is the first program in offensive technologies in India and allows learners to practice in a real-time simulated ecosystem, that will give them an edge in this competitive world.

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