Imagine waking up with your organization’s confidential information being compromised due to insider theft or a hacking attack. All your customers’ PII (Personally identifiable information), important financials, and other business-critical information have been leaked and are available on the dark web. Sound like a nightmare? Well, for millions of Americans, it’s become an alarming reality.
Growing Data Breaches
A data breach occurs when unauthorized individuals gain access to your business’s confidential information. Various factors, such as hacking, phishing, or physical theft of devices, contribute to a data breach episode. The stolen data can include personal information, financial records, intellectual property, and other sensitive information, which, if compromised, can have a devastating impact, leading to identity theft, financial fraud, and a loss of trust among customers and stakeholders.
Data breaches have exploded in recent years, turning the U.S. into a land of cyber insecurity. In 2023, the United States experienced approximately 3,205 data breaches, affecting over 353 million individuals. This marks a significant rise, a 68% increase from the 1,108 breaches in 2020. That’s roughly equivalent to the entire U.S. population having their data compromised! And with the average cost of a data breach in the U.S. now topping $4.45 million (Source: IBM), it’s clear that this is a cause of concern for organizations of all sizes.
The reasons behind this surge in data breaches are concerning. From outdated security systems to the evolving techniques of cybercriminals to outpace traditional security measures, organizations are struggling to keep momentum in protecting themselves. Weaknesses in various areas, including websites, operating systems, software updates in endpoint devices, and poor data management, result in information getting compromised, leading to data breaches. Additionally, human mistakes also contribute to compromising data security; about 88% of data breaches involve some form of human error. Moreover, the transfer of IT assets at the end of their lifecycle, after project completion, or following the termination of a work-from-home employee poses chain of custody risks during transit, which can also result in data breach episodes. Inadequate tracking and authentication protocols can create vulnerabilities, enabling unauthorized access or device tampering. Given these multifaceted and unpredictable challenges, organizations must prioritize data security and maintain privacy while ensuring effective data sanitization when reallocating, re-assigning, or disposing of IT assets to erase data beyond recovery. This is crucial for safeguarding an organization’s business and its reputation. Let’s explore why data erasure is the preferred choice for mitigating data breach risks.
Data Erasure: A Critical Aspect of Data Security
To keep pace with global data protection regulations and standards secure media sanitization is an important aspect of data disposal to avoid massive penalties for data breaches. Data destruction technique like data erasure, a software-based overwriting is faster, easier, cost-effective, and helps in re-use and re-cycle of IT assets contributing to a sustainable circular economy.
Data Wiping also has an edge over physical destruction methods such as shredding and degaussing, which have a large number of limitations, including contributing to global e-waste and producing carbon emissions. Further data erasure is an environmentally friendly approach that allows devices to be reused or recycled rather than rendered useless and discarded. In contrast, methods like shredding and degaussing require specialized equipment that comes with a high cost, making them unaffordable for remote users & small business owners. Additionally, degaussing is limited to hard disk drives, magnetic tapes, and floppy disks, and data cannot be erased from SSDs or modern hybrid drives. Data Erasure, on the other hand, can erase a wide range of drives and devices, including HDD, SSD, Hybrid drives, Laptop, Desktop, PC, Macs, Mobile devices, and Servers. Data erasure, when performed using a professional data wiping tool, helps maintain audit trails and provides proof of data destruction for compliance with laws and regulations.
How Can Businesses Prevent Data Breach With Data Erasure?
Data breaches can have severe consequences for businesses, including financial losses, reputational damage, loss of customer trust, and legal implications. Here are some ways in which data erasure helps businesses evade data breach scenarios and protect sensitive data:
- Creating Data Management Policies: Organizations can create data management policies with clear guidelines for data classification, data retention, data disposal, and process to be followed. They can define protocols for managing end of life IT assets and process for data disposal before the device leaves the organizations premises. This way data security can be maintained.
- Erase Confidential Data: With data erasure practices, businesses can wipe sensitive & confidential information that is no longer needed securely. Data Hoarding can become a cause of concern when left unmanaged and with weak security systems. Hackers can find it easy to have access to this data that is piled unnecessarily.
- Wipe IT Assets Before Transit: Organizations can erase data remotely to protect data outside the central office. This ensures that devices used by remote employees or at off-site facilities are thoroughly sanitized before they are shipped, reducing the risk of data breaches from lost or stolen devices.
- Mitigating Chain of Custody Risk: There are chain of custody risks involved when you’re transferring, selling, or getting rid of old devices. By securely erasing data beforehand, you’re cutting down on the chances of sensitive info ending up where it shouldn’t. It’s just good practice to protect your organization’s data throughout its entire lifecycle.
Conclusion
Businesses need to address current gaps in their data security protocols by implementing effective strategies to mitigate data breach risks. These strategies should include robust data security measures, comprehensive employee training programs, and the use of certified data erasure software in their data destruction policy. Data erasure is a cost-effective and time-saving technique that significantly enhances data security and helps organizations contribute effectively to their ESG goals. As privacy regulations become increasingly stringent, data erasure stands out as one of the most effective solutions.
