In 2022, business leaders have their sights set on cybersecurity.
Travelers Companies released its 2022 Risk Index results in September. 26, outlining the main concerns of businesses.
According to a survey of more than 1,000 U.S. business decision makers, nearly 60 percent of respondents said they have some or a great deal of concern about cyber threats.
Concerns about widespread economic uncertainty, fluctuating oil and energy costs, the ability to attract and retain talent, and healthcare cost inflation were other top concerns.
“Companies must have plans in place to mitigate any associated operational and financial disruptions.”
traveler tim francis
Tim Francis, head of corporate networking at Travelers, said: “Cyber-attacks can shut down companies for extended periods of time or even fail, and companies must have plans in place to mitigate any associated operational and financial disruptions.”
The number of respondents who said their company had suffered a data breach or cyber incident increased for the seventh year in a row.
According to the survey, 26 percent of respondents said their company had been a cyber victim, with nearly half of those incidents occurring within the past 12 months.
“Effective measures to reduce the risk of becoming a cyber victim have been shown to work, but based on these findings, not enough companies are taking action,” Francis said.
Cyber Security Measures
Researchers have raised concerns about companies’ overconfidence in the online environment.
More than 90% of respondents said they believed their company had implemented best practices to mitigate cyber incidents, but future answers to questions did not support this claim.
According to the researchers, 64% of companies say they don’t use endpoint detection, 59% say they don’t conduct network assessments of vendors, and 53% don’t have an incident response plan.
“It’s never too late, and these steps can help businesses avoid devastating cyber incidents,” Francis said.
Multi-factor authentication adds a layer of protection to the login process and is a system that few companies have adapted to in recent years.
Microsoft says that 99.9 percent of account compromise attacks can be blocked by adding MFA to authenticate a computer’s identity.
Still, while 90 percent of leaders admitted they were familiar with security measures, only 52 percent of respondents said they implemented MFA for remote access.