Amid growing cases of cyber attacks around the world, a new report from US-based Verizon Enterprise Solutions has revealed that 20 per cent of cybersecurity incidents and 15 per cent of the data breaches in 2018 originated from people within the organisation. Insiders have advantages over external actors seeking to circumvent security as people within the organisation enjoy trust and privileges as well as knowledge of organisational policies, processes and procedures, said the Verizon Insider Threat Report.
“Cyber threats do not just originate from external sources, and to fight cybercrime in its entirety we also need to focus on the threats that lie within an organisation’s walls,” Bryan Sartin, Executive Director Security Professional Services, Verizon, said in a statement.
The report highlighted that organisations need to pay particular attention to the types of insider threats that they can face. These threats can arise both from careless workers and also from those who were recruited, solicited or bribed by external parties to exfiltrate data.
Employees or partners with access to corporate assets who use existing privileges to access information for personal gain can also be responsible for such threats. Moreover, business partners who compromise security through negligence, misuse or malicious access to or use of an asset may also give rise to security threat, the report said.