These days, just about every individual and business relies on the internet. Individuals use it for everything from banking to making routine purchases. They also use it as their primary communication and entertainment method. Businesses use it to sell their wares, communicate, and for myriad other purposes. However, the convenience and utility that the internet unlocks is not without its drawbacks. The biggest among these is that it makes users vulnerable to all manner of data theft. Criminal elements regularly attack business networks and individuals’ devices in search of vulnerabilities to exploit. That means it’s incumbent on all internet users to take cybersecurity seriously. Here are the three main reasons why they should.
1- Preventing Identity Theft
One of the most important reasons to take cybersecurity seriously is that it’s necessary to prevent identity theft. According to the latest available data, around 23.9 million Americans fall victim to identity theft per year. Economically, those incidents resulted in $16.4 billion in losses. Identity theft can occur when a cybercriminal gains access to an individual’s personally identifiable data. This can happen in multiple ways, but there are two that are the most common. One is called phishing. This is when an attacker targets an individual with a false email, phone call, or website. Their objective is to trick the person into divulging personal information or login credentials. The attacker then uses that information to pose as the targeted individual. The second most common situation that leads to identity theft is a business data breach. This happens when an attacker gains access to a business database containing customer data or credentials. In that scenario, an attacker could gather enough data to facilitate identity theft on a massive scale.
2- Protecting Vulnerable Supply Chains
Another reason to take cybersecurity seriously is that it’s essential to protecting the supply chains that power the global economy. As the COVID-19 pandemic aptly demonstrated, global supply chains are quite vulnerable to disruption. Cybercriminals took note of that and have been involved in the attack ever since. The freight industry has been particularly under siege. Since 2017, businesses in the freight and logistics industries have experienced a 400% increase in cyberattacks. Attackers typically try to grind a freight business’s operations to a halt to extract a ransom from them. In the process, they create a ripple effect throughout the supply chain that raises costs for both businesses and consumers alike.
3- Keeping Healthcare Infrastructure Functional
Finally, there’s a life and death-reason to take cybersecurity seriously. It’s to make certain that healthcare resources remain available when people need them. The healthcare industry is another prime target for cybercriminals in the current cybersecurity environment. In 2023 alone, an astonishing 133 million healthcare records were exposed, with 79.7% of those happening as a result of a hack.
Cybersecurity Is an Essential Undertaking
The bottom line is that cybersecurity is an essential undertaking in the modern world. With almost every part of our economy and daily lives dependent on digital and internet-connected systems, we ignore it only at our own peril. All signs point to the threats to our data and digital systems continuing to increase for the foreseeable future. So, everyone must realize that they have a responsibility to take cybersecurity seriously both in their personal and professional lives.
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