| Link(s): | Organisations must do more to combat the growing threat of cyber attacks | ICO Learning from the mistakes of others – A retrospective review | ICO |
Context
The ICO is calling for all organisations to boost their cyber security and protect the personal information they hold, amid the growing threat of cyber attacks.
The ICO’s own trend data shows an increase in organisations experiencing cyber security breaches that put people’s personal information at risk, with over 3,000 cyber breaches reported in 2023. Finance (22%), retail (18%) and education (11%) were the sectors reporting the most incidents.
Key points to note and next actions
In its new report, the ICO has analysed the data breach reports it has received and shared lessons that can be learnt from common security mistakes.
The “Learning from the mistakes of others” report has practical advice to help organisations to understand common security failures and take simple steps to improve their own security, preventing future data breaches before they can happen. The report focuses on five leading causes of cyber security breaches:
- Phishing – where scam messages trick the user and persuade people to share passwords or accidentally download malware.
- Brute force attacks – where criminals use trial and error to guess username and password combinations, or encryption keys.
- Denial of service – where criminals aim to stop the normal functioning of a website or computer network by overloading it.
- Errors – where security settings are misconfigured, including being poorly implemented, not maintained and or left on default settings.
- Supply chain attacks – where products, services, or technology you use are compromised and then used to infiltrate your own systems.
For each cause, the report explains how these attacks take place, some key considerations to mitigate the risk and likely future developments. It also includes case studies from our regulatory activities.