ICO Releases Q4 Data Security Incident Trends Report

The ICO has released its latest Data Security Incident Trends revealing data breaches that were reported to it in Q4 (January-March 2018). Simon McCalla, CTO at Nominet commented below.

Simon McCalla, CTO at Nominet:

“It’s perhaps unsurprising that data security incidents reported to the ICO in the first quarter of 2018 are on the up. As it points out, in the run-up to GDPR a lot of companies will have become more cautious about incidents and reporting them. Interestingly, there are far more incidents caused by human error than there are external cyber threats, suggesting that a lot more work needs to be done on training employees.

“Often, however, cyber threats can lay unnoticed for months or even years and so this data may well be skewed towards incidents that are immediately identifiable. This information should not, therefore, lure anyone into a false sense of security. We’d encourage all organisations across the UK to up their vigilance against any and all threats, whether that’s external threats lying dormant or unwitting employees making mistakes.”