The conundrum that faces the staff charged with keeping IT secure, is that there are a multitude of different threats. They include:

• Data theft
• Financial fraud
• Malicious damage to computer resources, company web sites or data
• Theft of computer resources (especially laptops)
• Abuse of computer resources (viruses, unauthorized software, etc.)
• Denial of service attacks.

The most costly security incidents involve financial fraud or data theft, particularly the theft of credit card information, which has a particularly high cost. This cost stems from several different factors including:

• Internal investigation expenses that follows any data theft incident.
• Crisis management costs, particularly notifying affected customers.
• Regulatory non-compliance penalties, including state and federal fines and fees.

There is also a reputational cost which may exceed all of these costs. Read this whitepaper from Hurwitz & Associates to learn more about data security and in particular how to protect your company's sensitive data with an integrated encryption solution.