We focus on the latest news surrounding data breaches, leaks and hacks plus daily internet security articles.
The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has issued Concept Car Credit Limited with an enforcement notice after the company was found to have sent out hundreds of thousands of spam text messages.
The ICO based the sanction on Data Protection legislation for breaching regulations under the EU Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulation (PECR).
read more
They may not be the only ones given data breaches are increasing over here in the U.K. too; so will we follow suit?
There is no doubt that cyber-security is one of the top concerns for the developed world. In an age where almost everything is digitalised and connected to the internet, cybercriminals have the power to bankrupt a multi-billion dollar business enterprise, collapse global organisations and even cause untold chaos to governments.
Legislative governments across the world are having to vote in new laws and regulations to defend against cybercrime. Now, the U.S. Congress are coming up with all sorts of ideas on how best to combat cybercrime, including the best procedures for reporting data breaches.
read more
Data breaches are at an ‘all-time high’. In this modern world where most things are done electronically and are connected to the internet, without sufficient cyber-security, our data is exposed to cybercriminals who can steal our money, spread our personal information around, and wreak havoc with our identities.
Whilst many encourage development of new applications and innovative software to help us share information at a click of a button, and pay our bills with a swipe of a finger, cyber-security is falling behind.
With the growing trend of breaches, what can we do to fully protect ourselves? Do we all need “military-grade” protection like our armed forced and government intelligence agencies do?
read more
Anger amongst WWE wrestling fans is thought to be rife after revelations that up to three million fans’ account information has been left unprotected and accessible on the Amazon cloud.
It’s thought that WWE is watched by 15 million fans each week in the U.S. alone. In 2016, they announced plans to expand to China, opening a potential fan base of 1.4 billion. It’s scary to think that an organisation as big as this and with so many fans could leave data belonging to three million people totally unsecured.
It’s one heck of a monumental data breach…
read more
A number of employees at Google have been warned that some of their personal information may have been compromised because of a third party data breach.
Sabre Hospitality Solutions is a platform allowing users to plan trips and book hotels through their site. Sabre developed the SynXis Central Reservation System to allow guests, hotels and travel agencies from all over the world to book travel and accommodation through the unified service.
Google uses Calson Wagonlit Travel as the middle-man to arrange work-related trips for its employees. Unfortunately, Sabre’s database was hacked, meaning personal information belonging to Google’s recently travelled employees may have been compromised.
read more
Data breaches have become the talk of the town in the privacy world for decades. The apparent lax attitude of some companies and organisations appears to have resulted in data breach costs soaring.
The 2016 Cost of Data Breach Study, undertaken by Ponemon and IBM, found that the average total cost of a data breach increased from £2.37 million in 2014 to £2.53 million in 2015.
And we can only see it growing and growing…
read more
Gloucester City Council have let down employees after cyber-attackers accessed their personal details. The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has imposed a monetary penalty of £100,000 for their reportedly lax attitude.
On 7th April 2014, there was the vulnerability known as ‘Heartbleed’ which gathered huge media attention. The vulnerability was quickly addressed as the affected software (‘OpenSSL’) was released which fixed the vulnerability. Unfortunately, the vulnerability was overlooked as Gloucester City Council was in the process of outsourcing its IT services to a third party company on 1st May 2014.
read more
Medicaid was started in the U.S to help families and individuals who struggle to pay for medical care. The social healthcare program is run by the government and provides financially limited people with free health insurance.
As we know, organisations like this are just as vulnerable as others to data breaches, data leaks, and cyber hacks.
In this instance, patient data was reportedly accidentally made live through a hyperlink (internet web link). The hyperlink was publicly accessible, meaning anyone who clicked on it could see the medical information contained on it.
read more
Health data breaches have seen an unprecedented rise in recent times. Overwhelmed and untrained healthcare administrators appear to be making simple errors in some cases, and as a result, millions of people are at risk of their personal information being released.
On top of this, cyber criminals are targeting hospitals, GP practices and University health research facilities to steal and hold medical data for ransom. In the ever-advancing digital world, our cyber security measures are failing to keep up, and it seems like the healthcare sector still remains way off the mark.
read more
A data breach is the intentional or unintentional release of secure or private/confidential data by, say, employees, cyber-hackers, political activists or national governments.
The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is the U.K.’s independent privacy watchdog who have the responsibility of upholding information rights for the benefit of the public interest. Though there isn’t a legal responsibility on companies and/or organisations to report all data security breaches, it’s considered good practice to do so.
Here’s a look at some of the recent data security incident trends from the ICO.
read more
EasyJet admits data of nine million hacked
British Airways data breach: How to claim up to £6,000 compensation
Are you owed £5,000 for the Virgin Media data breach?
Virgin Media faces £4.5 BILLION in compensation payouts
BA customers given final deadline to claim compensation for data breach
Shoppers slam Morrisons after loyalty points stolen
Half a million customers can sue BA over huge data breach
Lawyers accuse BA of 'swerving responsibility' for data breach
The biggest data breaches of 2020
Fill out our quick call back form below and we'll contact you when you're ready to talk to us.