The issue of data security is so pervasive that it has moved from an IT and boardroom discussion to become the topic of movies and television shows. More than 7 billion records were exposed through breaches in just the first nine months of 2017, a jump of over 300 percent from the prior year. Five of the top breaches in 2017 were among the largest ten breaches of all time. With over five million records lost or stolen every day, protecting businesses and consumers from data breaches is a top concern among executives in all industries. While there is a tendency to think of data breaches in terms of the web and digital initiatives, security is no less critical for printing operations.
Printing organizations, particularly in-plant operations within financial services and healthcare organizations, can be targets in their own right, or simply points of entry for hackers to gain access to the corporate network. Over half (52%) of breaches in the United States were due to hackers and criminal insiders, ii however 49% of companies surveyed by Ponemon Institute in 2016 acknowledged a data breach caused by a third-party vendor that resulted in the misuse of sensitive or confidential information and another 16% were not certain that such an event had not occurred. iii This gives print buyers a great deal of concern about the data security of their suppliers and should, in turn, make printing organizations take careful account of the security procedures of their own business partners.
