The Cost of Being Hacked

The costs of hack attacks to any organization are extensive with possible financial burdens that may result in closure:

* Loss of customer confidence, trust and reputation with the consequent harm to brand equity and consequent effects on revenue and profitability; * Possible loss of the ability to accept certain payment instruments e.g. VISA, Mastercard * Negative impact on revenues and profits arising from any falsified transactions and from employee downtime; * Website downtime which is in effect the closure of one of the most important sales channels for an e-business; * The expenditure involved in repairing the damage done and building contingency plans for securing compromised websites and web applications; and, * Legal battles and related implications from Web application attacks and lax security measures including fines and damages to be paid to victims.

The figure above shows the total losses as reported by the 2005 CSI/FBI Annual Computer Crime and Security Survey.

The total losses per category of breach (valid only for the US) is reported to be over $130 m for the 639 respondents willing and able to estimate their losses. The Survey authors also state that while explicit costs (such as costs of reinstalling software and reconfiguring computer systems) is more accurately accounted for by respondents, implicit costs (such as lost future sales due to negative media coverage following a breach) is more difficult to account for and are largely not represented in the loss numbers reported here.

Now does it sound apocalyptic? I believe there is serious need for all to worry.

Acunetix Web Vulnerability Scanne

Learn more about Acunetix Web Vulnerability Scanner (http://www.acunetix.com/vulnerability-scanner) and how the solution helps to regularly audit your website and web applications for vulnerabilities to hacking attacks.

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