While the number of breaches reported in the first half of 2022 was lower than in the same period in 2021, Flashpoint expects the final number to be similar.
A success data breach can impact an organization not only by compromising sensitive information, but also act as a prelude to ransomware and more devastating cyberattacks. In a new report titled Smart data breach status: Mid-2022 releaseSecurity firm Flashpoint looks at the number and types of data breaches reported in the first half of 2022.
Data breaches down 15% year over year
So far, 1,980 violate was reported by organizations in the first half of this year. This is about 15% lower than the first half of 2021 volume, which seems like a positive trend. However, the numbers can be deceiving, especially since organizations don’t necessarily report violations in a timely manner.
“There are many reasons for the reduction in data breaches, but the main one is the slowness of breach disclosure,” said Inga Goddijn, Vice President of Structured Intelligence at Flashpoint. “The good news is that reporting cadences are starting to return to normal. As the reporting catches up, we predict the true number of breaches will equal or exceed 2021.”
During the same period, the number of records exposed as a result of the breach fell significantly to 1.4 billion this year from last year’s 27.3 billion, the lowest level since 2015. The drop is the result of less open misconfigured services and reported database breaches, one Goddijn added.
Last year saw 13 breaches affecting 100 million records or more. There are only three such cases this year. An example from last year is FBS Markets Breach Reported March 2021resulted in a leak of about 16 billion records.
Looking at the annual totals, the number of violations continued to increase for several years before decreasing in 2020. The number increased from 6,807 in 2017 to 7,154 in 2018 and then 7,632 in 2019. Since then, this number drops significantly to 4,472 in 2020 and then inched up to 4,630 in 2021. The total for 2022 is difficult to forecast at this point but could be equal to or higher than the total for 2021.
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Causes of data breaches
Most (60%) of violations reported in the first half of 2022 were caused by hack, which has been the leading type of violation for many years. The cause is unclear in about 11% of breaches, while others are triggered by viruses or fraud.
Of the breaches with identifiable cause, about a quarter occurred within the affected organization, indicating some type of insider threat. Of these, most (61%) were attributed to mistakes in data processing rather than malicious intent. However, the rest is due to actions ranging from small-scale theft of customer credit card data to the theft of technological innovations and proprietary source code.
Looking at the types of data stolen due to the breach in the first half of the year, Flashpoint found that names were the most compromised item, followed by social security numbers. Other types of data captured in the breach include addresses, financial information, dates of birth, account information, medical information, email addresses, credit card numbers, and passwords.
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Avoid data breaches
How can organizations better protect themselves from data breaches? Flashpoint offers some tips.
First, you need to make sure that the database you deploy is secure and resistant to attacks and compromises. Second, you need robust patch and vulnerability management programs, especially if you depend on any kind of public data, such as those from NIST. National Vulnerability Database or of CISA List of Known Exploited Vulnerabilities. Since more than 60% of reported breaches are due to hacking, organizations must be able to fix security vulnerabilities affecting their assets.
