GDPR came in with a whimper and we’re now all waiting to hear it roar. At the same time, a report from Thales informs us that the UK stinks at cyber security.
According to the report:
- 71% of European enterprises have been breached
- 32% have been breached in the last year
- 78% are storing or using sensitive data in the Cloud
- 37% of UK businesses have been breached in the last 12 months, up from 22% in 2017, and compared to 27% in the Netherlands, 30% in Sweden and 33% in Germany.
Worryingly, UK businesses seem to be somewhat complacent about their risk profile. While 31% feel extremely vulnerable (compared to 37% being breached), 49% of Swedish businesses feel very vulnerable (compared to 30% being breached).
Where the UK can pat itself on the head is that only 19% of UK PLCs failed their GDPR-compliant data security audits, compared to 49% in Sweden, 38% in the Netherlands and 33% in Germany.
There’s an upside in this story of woe for savvy B2B service providers. Since trust is an essential component of digital economy success, and organisations are focused on the need for GDPR compliance, there are clear opportunities to assist business customers in compliance and cyber security.
The Thales report shows that 72% of organisations see data-in-motion defences as highly effective and 68% see network-level defences as extremely effective. Mobile and end-point security trails somewhat behind with only 60% rating it as effective.
These are areas that B2B service providers should be focusing on. What’s more, a significant number of enterprises intend to increase spending in these areas – 42% say they will increase spend on data-in-motion defences, 44% on network-level defences and over half of enterprises (51%) will increase spending on mobile defences.
For B2B service providers looking for new areas to increase revenues, these statistics should make very interesting reading.
