Over the last few decades, there is quite a rise in insider threat incidents. And they are poised to grow this year in 2021 as well. Especially during this Covid pandemic phase, many organizations have been working remotely. And that makes it even more vulnerable to combat against internal breaches.
According to the Forrester insider threat statistics report, more than 30% of the cases simply happen because of internal incidents. Such incidents can happen both accidentally or with malicious intent. And also, they are not easy to detect.
However, to overcome this situation, now we can utilize technological solutions to monitor workforces’ activities and detect data breaches, cyber threats, internal accidents, employee fraud like threats even before it happens.
So, here we have shown some eye-opening insider threat statistics that can point out some ways to shore up your own organization during this pandemic phase.
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Insider Threats Increased By 47% In Past 2 Years-
In the past 2 years, internal cyber threats have gone up by 47%. It includes both accidental threats and employee fraud attempts. Especially if you see in health care and manufacturing industries, there are many incidents where employees misuse their privileges. On the other hand, miscellaneous errors in financial business can lead to huge losses.
In fact, employee negligence is one of the most common things to happen and accounts for more than 60% of insider incidents in the workspace. All the more, it is also not safe to give further responsibilities to such negligent employees. Since 25% of the time, negligent employees get easily phished or get their credentials stolen by others.
Not Easy To Identify-
It is not easy for the management to identify the cause of every data threat or breach issue happening in their organization. And even if they found out about it, they might not be able to take the necessary action to prevent that. Do you know the reason why? Because in most cases, the source of the threat is not easily identifiable.
When working online, the data transfers, downloads, and uploads are about to happen between sources and destinations. And most of these signals are encrypted to protect the identity of users, which is actually a good thing from the security point of concern. But it also backfires when you are trying to identify the source and receiver end. In fact, more than one-quarter of the time, data theft/ fraud gets reported because they cannot detect their sources.
Fortunately, we have tools like EmpMonitor, which allows you to monitor the work behavior of employees. Let your employees know that you are monitoring their computer activities. So they can be aware and not show any negligence in their work.
Global Spending On Cybersecurity-
Around the world the expenditure on cybersecurity has increased by 10% in 2021 which is more than $60 billion. Last year it was $54.7billion recorded and predicted that it would have at least 6.6% of growth in future. However, the stats have already crossed over the old figures. Even beside intentional threats, human errors are continuously provoking companies to spend more and more on improving the data security of their business. Based on the experts predictions, it is likely to grow more in future.
If you are really looking to ensure data security in your business, then instead of spending too much on expensive tools and software why don’t you try EmpMonitor.
Insiders Are Responsible For 30% Incidents-
According to the PwC cybercrime survey report, more than 30% of data thefts are caused by insiders only. In these incidents many times, employees may even be unaware of the situation and unintentionally may become bait for a phishing trap. To avoid such things from happening, you should train your employees to become more responsible and be aware of such frauds.
Read More
What Is An Insider Threat? Definition, Types, And Preventions
Insider Threat Detection: How to Identify and Prevent Internal Risks
Internal Threat Takes More Time To Resolve-
Based on the analysis, we found that if an insider attack takes a long time to detect, it will cost you more. Suppose, if an incident takes 90 days more time to resolve, it will cost an average of $13.7 million per annum more than the actual expenses.
On the other hand, if it takes 30 days to resolve the issues, it would cost around an average of $7.12 million. The longer it takes to detect the source insider, the more will be the expenditure. Nowadays, to overcome this challenge, employers are implementing real-time monitoring solutions like EmpMonitor. It has features like auto screenshots, keystrokes logger, user log reports, and stealth mode tracking, which let you identify the source of data threats even before it happens for real.
Every One Out Of Five Incidents Are Phishing Traps-
According to the insider threat statistical report of 2020, we found that in most cases people fall for the traps prepared by cybercriminals. Such threats are also not easily detectable. Even with so much on employee training, 20% of incidents are caused due to work negligence behavior by employees. Though training might help you to reduce these numbers. However, you should also implement employee computer tracking solutions to identify the real source of such incidents.
Misuse Of Privileges In The Workplace-
Almost 50% of intentional cyber threats are caused internally by the people who have privileges in their organization. It has been reported that people at the admin level may misuse their powers to cause internal threats for business. In order to avoid such problems, even the leaders need to be more accountable regarding business compliance. And if they are negligent to fulfil their right duties, it’s better to limit or remove their access to such privileges.
Types of Internal Threats
While you might see internal threats as one thing, however, there are different types of insiders that might be lurking around your business. Here we have shown several types of insider threats that you may find in your organization.
Negligent Employees- These are the employees who may cause unintentional errors due to which the company can suffer data threats or breaches like issues.
Malicious Employees- These are the employees who intentionally cause harm towards the business to gain some extra income into their pocket.
Cyber Traps- Cybercriminals are quite expert in their job. And sometimes they may even trap your employees through sending phishing emails (malware, virus). In such a case, employees need to be more alert to avoid such cyber traps.
Inside Agents- These are employees who are in partnership with hackers to provide them with important business data. Such employees can take advantage of their privilege to cause stealing of data or may even infect the internal data (using malware).
End Words- Insider Threat Statistics
By going through the above-shown insider threats statistics, you might have already understood. What you can do is to improve the monitoring policies in your business to inspect all these issues.
Even though the statistics are not looking that great, businesses around the world are also overcoming these challenges. Taking technological solutions (like Empmonitor) by your side, you can simply prevent those internal threats. Taking technological solutions (like Empmonitor) by your side, you can simply prevent those internal threats.
So, what are your thoughts about these insider threat statistics? If you have anything more to say, then please mention that in the comments section. And please don’t forget to share this blogpost with others who may really need this.
