Companies hit with a data breach pay an average of $3.86 million around the world, marking a 6.4% increase from last year. It’s no small amount for any company, but a few million is only a small fraction of the cost of “mega breaches,” which compromise at least 1 million records.
The “2018 Cost of a Data Breach Study,” sponsored by IBM Security and conducted by the Ponemon Institute, annually evaluates the total cost of security incidents. This marks the first time researchers calculated costs associated with breaches ranging from 1 million to 50 million lost records.
So what’s the damage? It turns out massive security breaches come with equally large price tags, ranging from $40 million for 1 million records lost to $350 million for 50 million records lost.
