UK suffered most data breaches in Europe at the beginning of 2015

In the first half of the 2015, the UK reportedly suffered the most data breaches in Europe in 2015 according to data from Gemalto.

The SIM card and digital security vendor claimed in their Breach Level Index report that 63 breaches took place in the UK in the first six months of 2015. Germany came next with 8, followed by the Netherlands with 6.

However, it only equated to 3.4% (8.3 million) of the global total of 246 million breaches. In comparison with America, who equated to 49%, and Turkey with 26%, the UK pales in comparison; but the figures are still very high.

There was a 10% increase in 2015 on the previous year, but numbers of stolen records had reduced by 41% as fewer “mega breaches” took place, according to the report. However, the US Office of Personal Management (21 million), Anthem (79 million), and Turkey’s General Directorate of Population and Citizenship Affairs (50 million) kept the numbers staggeringly high.

Healthcare and industry make up the majority of data breaches

Unsurprisingly, healthcare and industry accounted for the majority of compromised records in the first half of the year, with retail dropping from 38% to 4% in that period. It is believed the findings in the report are simply the tip of the iceberg for global breaches, and the records were only about breaches that were publicly announced.

Paul Hampton, Gemalto security expert, believes that:

“These numbers are likely to change once the European disclosure rules come into effect, as organisations will have to collect, store, access, and secure data in new ways. Most importantly, they will have to notify both authorities and affected individuals when a data breach occurs.”

Organisations are not always able to recognise that a breach has taken place. As most of the time, hackers just want to copy information and not cause any malicious damage. It is possible that many organisations wouldn’t have even realised that a breach has occurred. Sometimes the breach doesn’t come to light for years after when data suddenly becomes available for the sale on the so called “dark web”.

Have you been a victim of a data breach?

Here at the Data Breach Lawyers, our expert team is helping huge volumes of people for both individual breaches and group action breaches.

We are currently working on data breaches like the 56 Dean Street incident and are still taking on those who have been affected by the breach. Other cases include the huge TalkTalk breach and the breaches at the University of Greenwich.

If you have been affected by a data breach then we can help. We urge you to contact us if you have been affected. If we think you have a claim we can help get you the compensation that you deserve.

Source: http://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/uk-tops-european-data-breach-table/