Data distribution disturbs peace of mind

Netwrix has released its 2020 Data Risk & Security Report, which gathered insights from 1,045 respondents worldwide. The study aimed to find out how organisations treat their sensitive and regulated data during each stage of its lifecycle to identify potential security gaps.

The survey showed that data storage is the most problematic stage for British organisations. Even though the vast majority of the respondents (91%) were sure that their sensitive data was stored securely, every fourth (27%) organisation discovered it outside of designated secure locations in the past 12 months. The data was left overexposed for days (33%) or weeks (22%). Incidents with misplaced data is a common trend worldwide. However the UK companies are more prone to it, especially if compared to other European countries, where on average only 18% had similar incidents.

“Today, understaffed IT departments in the UK organisations experience significant pressure as they not only have to protect their organisations against cyber threats and respond to auditors’ requests, but also to manage DSAR requests. With such a workload, they struggle to ensure their sensitive data is equally protected at all stages of data lifecycle, and often fail. To address this challenge, the UK cyber security leaders need to obtain visibility into all internal processes and user activity that involve sensitive data. This will enable them to prioritise their efforts and mitigate security and compliance risks more efficiently,” said Matt Middleton-Leal, EMEA and APAC General Manager at Netwrix.