It’s time we put a number on cyber security.
In other words, a tangible figure the cyber-security-curious can refer to that shows the real benefits of working with Intersys.
The number’s a pretty big one. And it may be a useful piece of evidence to present to decision-makers who need that final nudge to get your cyber security house in order.
We’ll save the figure until later, because we want to give some context to the information that follows. Naturally, many of you will possess the Power of Scrolling Down a Page so, if you can’t resist, the important number is further below.
First, some cyber security housekeeping
When talking about cyber security, it’s important to differentiate between a cyber attack and a cyber breach.
Cyber attack – a deliberate attempt by cyber criminals or hostile states to breach an individual or organisation’s computer systems. Attacks are not always successful, but they do happen all the time. A good example is phishing. It’s estimated that 3.4 billion phishing emails are sent out by criminals every single day. But if you have strong email security, 99% will get blocked by your email filters.
Cyber breach – a term used to describe a successful cyber attack. This is when the bad guys manage to access your IT environment such as emails, computer systems, files, bank accounts, etc. Often, this will occur because a user is taken in by a phishing email.
This is how often cyber attacks and breaches happen on average
The UK government’s Cyber Security Breaches Survey 2024 was published on 9 April. It is based on random telephone and online surveys of 2000 UK businesses, 1004 UK registered charities and 430 education institutions.
Here’s some highlights lowlights:
- 50% of businesses overall and 32% of charities overall have experienced some form of cyber security breach or attack in the last 12 months.
- 70% of medium businesses, 74% of large businesses and 66% of high-income charities (over £500,000 in annual income) have experienced a breach / attack in the past year.
- £1205 is the average cost of a breach for businesses of any size; £10,830 for medium and large businesses; and £460 for charities.
If you’re inclined to say, ‘To be honest, this isn’t ideal but we could just about soak up that amount’ – consider this. The cost in terms of damaged reputation and lost business is likely to be far larger than the figures quoted above.
Cyber attacks are 10 TIMES less likely to occur if you work with Intersys
Intersys clients are ten times less likely to suffer a cyber attack than the national average. This number is based on our internal data and average figures from the UK government’s survey quoted above.
Our sophisticated monitoring of your IT estate – via human engineers and advanced AI technology – can ensure the vast majority of attacks do not infiltrate systems or reach end users.
In a world where businesses are looking for marginal gains and incremental edges to help them prosper, this ’10 X less likely’ figure is an order-of-magnitude benefit. For any organisations wishing to work with us, we are happy to share client-anonymised data from our own systems proving the claim.
But the good news doesn’t end there, because our high-level monitoring helps to ensure a further level of protection. If one of our Cyber Security Operations Centre clients were to get taken in by social engineering, our team would notice this suspicious activity and stop it before any damage occurred.
‘Hang on, but what about…’
Quite rightly, you’ll want to start questioning that 10 X figure and attacking it from various angles – because you know decision-makers in your organisation certainly will.
Here’s a couple of possible objections:
‘Ah, but then you would expect attacks to come down when you employ the services of a cyber security provider.’
True, but bear in mind the Cyber Security Breaches Survey is a random survey. This means it will include organisations with various degrees of cyber security awareness and support – everything from, ‘Come on in, the data’s lovely,’ to ‘Eat. My. Firewall.’
What next?
If you like what you’ve read and you are interested, get in touch to discuss your needs. That can include an assessment of your current cyber security and recommended actions to harden your security. We realise different organisations have varying needs and budgets, and we’ll ensure our quote is realistic and achievable according to your specific circumstances.
Finally, we get that you may feel some resistance contacting a cyber security provider. How much will they charge? Will they try to sell me things I don’t need? Will the quote be more scary than a ransomware attack? If any of that resonates, we’d strongly recommend you read a little about our leadership team and values, to get a sense of how we operate.
Intersys is an ISO 27001-certified cyber security provider offering varying cyber security services from a baseline cyber security hardening service to high level cyber security as a service (CSaaS). We can provide PEN testing, cyber security gap analysis services and a ransomware recovery service.
Our clients include financial services providers and FinTech firms, life sciences companies, and many highly regulated industries. Take a look at some of our cyber security and IT case studies.