{"id":221,"date":"2012-06-29T04:02:53","date_gmt":"2012-06-29T04:02:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/?p=221"},"modified":"2012-06-29T04:02:53","modified_gmt":"2012-06-29T04:02:53","slug":"small-businesses-are-prime-targets-for-data-breaches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/small-businesses-are-prime-targets-for-data-breaches\/","title":{"rendered":"Small businesses are prime targets for data breaches"},"content":{"rendered":"

How seriously are you taking the risk of a data breach? If you think it can\u2019t happen to your company, consider the following. According to Verizon\u2019s 2011 annual Data Breach Investigations Report,<\/a> organizations with between 11 and 100 employees reported 436 data breaches last year\u00a0 –\u00a0 almost six times as many as organizations with between 101 and 1,000 employees<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Making the situation even more serious is the fact that today\u2019s data breaches are no longer the work of hackers trying to make a name for themselves.\u00a0 Patrick Gray, a senior security analyst with Cisco who spent 20 years with the FBI, points out that the Internet is under threat from organized crime out for financial gain.<\/p>\n

Despite the threat, many small business owners are not concerned about the possibility of a data breach; nor are they planning to take any preventive measures. The Hartford recently conducted a survey <\/a>of 501 small business owners with fewer than 50 employees. The survey found that 85 percent of respondents believe a data breach is \u2018unlikely\u2019 and many are not implementing even simple security measures to prevent one.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t be an easy target <\/strong><\/p>\n

While small business owners may lack concern about data breaches, six out of 10 surveyed by The Hartford indicated that having one would compromise customer relationships. They also said they have a more negative opinion of companies that recently experienced a breach based on the way they handled it.<\/p>\n

With so much at stake for your business — downtime, loss of critical and sensitive customer and employee data, and your reputation — you don\u2019t want to wait for a breach to occur. There are relatively simple steps you can implement in little time to protect your data.<\/p>\n