Net Gains
Hardly a week goes past without a report of the theft of personal details by a hacker or criminal organisation or the mislaying of confidential data. We only have to look at the recent lost child benefit information to see how easily it can happen.
The protection and proper use of data stored is becoming much more important. Because of the increasing number of businesses that hold client details, more will need to take extra care to protect the information from accidental loss, malicious actions or theft for criminal purposes.
If the worse happens and data does get into third party hands with the customer suffering financial loss, then there is a strong presumption of negligence and compensation may need to be paid.
This is just one area of a new range of cyber liabilities that can arise in modern businesses. It is estimated that, worldwide, there are some 170 million websites, containing some 17 billion web pages accessed by over one billion people annually.
The sheer scale of electronic use exposes businesses to thoughtless or malicious acts on an unimaginable scale.
There are now great risks of employees maliciously or inadvertently breaching copyright, data protection, trademark or plagiarism legislation, transmitting viruses and creating a whole host of other potentially litigious situations.
If a company uses email, it is in effect a publisher and its employees are its authors. A
publisher would never release a story until it has been thoroughly checked. Apart from the breaches outlined above this can lead to libel, defamation and other such actions.
High-tech crime is estimated to account for more than one third of financial crime in the UK and more than 77 per cent of bigger businesses reported virus attacks costing large sums.
A company’s first priority should be to ensure that security is in place to reduce the chances of attack and that rules are enforced regarding passwords and email use.
However, rules can be ignored and security breached. To protect your business further, insurance is available as a safety net.
Insurance can provide protection against accidental breach of copyright, defamation and libel, network breaches by third parties and unknowingly spreading viruses. It can cover claims against you and, in some cases, the cost of putting your own system right.
Few businesses could operate today without the advantages and convenience that e-commerce brings – but we should all be aware that the risks are growing as well.
Submitted by: Sunderland Business Network