Businesses shouldn’t ever take data breaches lightly. Not only do they hinder operations and cause monetary losses, but they can also cause legal troubles for businesses.
Sadly, even with tight security, breaches can occur in any business of any size. Statistics show that 6.06 billion malware attacks occurred worldwide in 2023 (Statista).
Here’s another interesting number – A study from the University of Maryland shows that a cyberattack is projected to occur every 39 seconds. That’s 90+ attacks per hour.
Unfortunately, it’s tough to prevent data breaches. But how businesses respond to them is crucial. Avoiding common mistakes and taking timely action can control the damage and prevent losses.
This article sheds light on common mistakes to avoid to minimise the impact of a data breach and outlines the essential steps for managing its aftermath.
Mistake # 1: Slow Response Time
Neglecting a breach after the signs are clear can be a huge mistake. Not only does it increase financial losses and damage business reputation, but it also gets harder to control with every minute and risks further data loss.
Act Quickly
Once you identify a breach, it’s time to respond quickly. Whether you have an in-house team to address the issue or you need external resources, the decision should be quick.
Every hour you spend being indecisive makes the breach more challenging to contain. Statistics show that it took an average of 64 days to contain a breach in 2024. So, the quicker you act, the faster you can regain access to your precious data and mitigate the damage.
Of course, there are times when multiple parties are involved in decision-making about the data breach. It’s best to inform the involved parties about the breach as soon as possible so you can conclude dealing with it.
Notify Stakeholders Promptly
Every business has multiple stakeholders who aren’t necessarily direct decision-makers. It’s imperative to inform them as well. One thing about data breaches is that they are hard to cover up.
Eventually, people realise that something suspicious is happening.
If you keep it unnecessarily covered, it can spark rumours about the business and damage your reputation. Be transparent to the relevant stakeholders, including customers, employees, and business partners.
Transparency helps people understand the situation and act accordingly. Notifying everyone enables you to avoid panic and confusion so you can focus on resolving the issues.
Also, share reassuring messages that you are working on the issue and will let them know as soon as things are back on track. It helps build integrity and maintain trust.
And don’t forget to tell the stakeholders if there’s anything they need to do to avoid personal losses.
Engage Legal and Regulatory Authorities
Data breaches can cause serious legal repercussions for businesses. It’s best to inform relevant regulatory authorities about the breach and take prompt action to comply with data protection laws.
It is in your best personal and business interest. If required, hire legal help.
Getting the regulatory bodies involved is essential to mitigate penalties and ensure transparency.
Mistake # 2: Inadequate Communication
Data breaches are challenging for businesses. As mentioned, on average, it takes 64 days to resolve the issue, which can be much longer, depending on various factors.
Businesses are often so engrossed in addressing data breach troubles that they overlook the critical importance of timely communication with stakeholders. However, this can lead to misunderstandings and frustration among the concerned parties.
Moreover, they’d be anxious about the data abuse and can take legal action against the business.
To prevent reputational damage and further losses, it’s best to proactively communicate the details about dealing with data breaches.
Have Dedicated Communication Channels
The best thing to do is to have dedicated channels for updates. That way, people will know about the progress, which will also relieve pressure on your business.
You can use several channels to communicate updates. Please ensure that you prioritise the ones that maximum people use. They could include:
- Social media updates on X, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.
- Sharing email sequences regularly about the progress.
- A dedicated hotline that people can contact to inquire about the recovery status.
- Timely updates on your website about actions being taken to address the issue.
Pro tip: We understand that data breaches are hard, but if you want to recover the damages and establish trust, always be transparent about the situation. Stakeholders will only understand the breach if you don’t hide anything.
Suspicious activities and messages can break trust, and a data breach can result in losses.
Avoid Jargon and Technical Language
Most businesses often forget that their customers, suppliers, or users aren’t as technically sound as the internal staff. So, when sharing information about the recovery progress, be aware of explaining the matters in the simplest possible language.
That way, you can cater to a wider public and communicate the intended message. In some cases where it’s important to use technical terminologies, a good practice would be to add explanatory notes so the message is delivered correctly.
Mistake # 3: Failing to Prevent the Breach Spread
Businesses make this critical mistake – they don’t take measures to limit the damage immediately. Avoid that.
Once a breach is detected, the first action is to prevent it from spreading further. Here’s how to do it:
Isolate the Affected Systems
Run a thorough analysis of your systems, servers, and related technology to identify and isolate the impacted ones. You can do it in the following ways:
- Disconnect systems from networks so they become inaccessible.
- Shut down infected systems so they don’t pass on the problem.
- Disable user accounts
These actions will help you contain the spread. Moreover, your IT department should analyse the situation and offer more preventative measures to limit the spreading of the breach.
Assess the Scope of the Breach
Once the breach is limited, it’s time to assess the damage and start working on recovery.
Identify the data you lost and how the breach happened. After calculating damages, notify the regulatory bodies and stakeholders and fix the troubles.
Bonus tip → Also, get the experts to give you estimated timelines for solving the breach and recovering data.
Deploy Preventative Measures
Right after the breach, every business must take action to ensure it doesn’t happen again.
In some cases, the cause is easy to identify; in others, it’s difficult, and you can only guess. Whatever the scenario, it’s best to tighten security and take the necessary steps to prevent data breach recurrence.
Also, people whose data was compromised should be immediately notified about potential fraudulent activities so they can be cautious. If you’ve lost their information, publishing messages on public platforms is best to minimise losses for others.
Mistake # 4: Neglecting Legal and Regulatory Requirements
Businesses sometimes try to hide information about the breach and fear the penalties or legal complications that breaches can cause. Unfortunately, that’s a failed strategy, which can lead to even more severe consequences.
Business laws are in place to help businesses run effectively while protecting stakeholders’ interests. These laws dictate how companies should proceed in case of data breaches. It’s always best to come out clean and work towards damage control.
Understand Your Legal Obligations
Businesses should understand data breach laws even before the incident occurs. That’s because legal authorities are particular about data compromises, and negligence can cause penalties.
It’s best to have some law professionals assist you. In case there’s a breach, it’s best to consult such professionals and share the details with relevant government bodies. Also, don’t delay in communicating the information about the data breach.
There are timelines under which you should report to the concerned departments, and late communication can be treated as a law violation, and you could end up paying heavily.
Bottom line – be proactive in this matter, or you can suffer business and even personal losses.
Document Your Response
Ensure that you record all the activities that took place when you were solving the data breach.
It helps maintain transparency and also prevents false accusations and legal troubles. Make a note of the following things:
- Timeline of events.
- How you communicated with the stakeholders and their response.
- The team that worked to resolve the issue and the steps they took.
This keeps you clean from unwanted and troublesome situations. Also, once the dust settles, you can show how actively you protected the data and use the documentation to regain consumer trust.
Mistake # 5: Overlooking the Human Element
While it’s true that many data breaches happen because of malware or phishing attacks, human error shouldn’t be overlooked as a cause.
Especially since remote work has become common, people can make errors and compromise the data. For instance, statistics show that 81% of confirmed breaches happened because of weak, reused, or stolen passwords (LastPass).
Another thing – many businesses are careless with sensitive files and give access to employees who don’t really need them. It increases the chances of errors or even motivates employees to carry out malicious activities.
So, what should we do if a human mistake caused the breach?
Support Affected Employees
Understand that employees may not always be technically sound and can mistakenly cause a breach.
While you identify the reasons for the incident, protecting your employees is crucial. You can do it by:
- Offering tools to employees to monitor suspicious activities.
- Communicate the details of the breach and educate them about protective measures.
- Listen to their concerns and try resolving them to the best possible capabilities.
Supporting employees is crucial. Even if the breach happened because of human errors, try to train the people on how to avoid such mishaps in the future. This helps keep employees motivated and maintains internal trust.
Learn from the Incident
Data breaches are very likely to happen. The numbers are increasing yearly, and your best move is to solidify the cyberwalls against malicious activities. However, even if a breach occurs after that, don’t just resolve the situation and move on.
Analyse what happened and how it did to prevent losses in the future. You can also conduct training programs and seminars to educate employees about data security best practices.
A Word of Caution → Put preventative measures like 2FA, weekly password changes, email best practices, etc., in place while protecting employees’ sensitive data. This can significantly reduce your chances of a data breach.
Allow Trusted IT Professionals To Manage Data Breaches For You
Data breach damage can be reduced significantly if experienced professionals handle the project.
If you don’t have a solid IT team in-house, chances are you’ll have difficulty managing breaches independently. And you’ll not have the luxury of time to hunt for the best options at the last moment.
If you want to prevent data breaches and manage them to reduce damages if an unfortunate event happens, contact us immediately!
