Cyber risk awareness not turning into action, survey finds

Many businesses, especially in Europe, fully understand the cyber risk they face, but have yet to implement solid plans to address it, including declining to buy cyber insurance, according to a new Risk:Value survey from NTT Com Security.

 “Study any risk-based discipline for long enough, and you will see a worrying trend: A large proportion of people understand the risk is there, but often do not address the problem until it is too late. People smoke, fail to exercise and eat bad food, while admitting that they understand the mortality statistics. On a broader scale, we know the climate change risks, but continue to burn carbon at furious rates. It’s as though we are somehow programmed to procrastinate,” stated the authors of the report. “The same is true in cybersecurity. Organizations may understand the likelihood of an intruder stealing their data. They may even understand how badly it will impact them. But they often tend to react impulsively after the fact, rather than responding thoughtfully to a threat well in advance.”

The report, which polled 1,000 executives in six countries, found that 25 percent of respondents are “certain” a cyber attack will affect them; another 40 percent think it’s fairly likely. The results also showed an alarming lack of confidence in organizations’ information security. Eighteen percent felt that poor security represents the greatest threat to their business, up from 9 percent a year ago. Nearly 75 percent said that they don’t feel their business data is secure, with many (four in 10) saying that their home computers would be a safer place to keep their business data. Fifty-six percent questioned whether all their critical data had been secured.

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