Data Security Audits: Ensuring the Security of Your Workplace
As cyberattacks become more prevalent and advanced, the risk of data breaches has increased significantly and have costed businesses millions in damages. According to IBM, the global average cost of a data breach increased 10% over the year 2024 to $4.88 million, the highest total ever. It is essential to have your businesses data security up to date now more than ever and to keep it consistently maintained. One of the key ways of ensuring your data security is through data security audits.
What is a Data Security Auditing?
A data security audit is the process of doing a thorough and comprehensive assessment of a company’s data systems in order to identify any possible weaknesses in the security such as loopholes and ensure the data security practices are up to date with industry practice, established standards, and even federal regulations if applicable.
Benefits of Data Security Auditing:
- Enhanced Security: Through audits, vulnerabilities in data security can be identified and dealt with so that your data is protected against potential attacks. They also provide a basis for where improvements can be made in security in the future and what risk assessment plans need to be put in place.
- Improved Data Quality: Data audits can identify any errors within data sets such as repeated data and inconsistencies. This results in improved quality and accuracy of the data you pull from and can lead to things such as better informed decision making.
- Increased Customer Trust: The risk of data breaches and incorrect data usage is significantly decreased from regular data auditing, resulting in maintaining and increasing customer trust.
How Often Should Data Security Audits Happen?
While it depends on the size and scope of your company, as well as any regulations it has to follow, it is generally recommended a data security audit happens at least once a year internally or with an external auditor.
However, many organizations have a more frequent schedule due to the growing risk of data breaches. These can have severe effects on a company and not only leak information, but lose customer trust in a way that will permanently damage your reputation as a business. Regular audits are an effective way to prevent possible data breaches, ensuring security is up to date on the data from any new types of cyberattacks or recently discovered loopholes that can be patched.
What Are the Risks of Not Conducting Data Security Audits?
There are many risks to not having regular data security audits. There’s not only the risk of data breaches and the costs of recovering from one, but several long lasting risks to your business.
Examples of Potential Risks:
- Poor Data Quality: Without regular audits, data that is incorrect or outdated can go unnoticed. This can result in faulty insights and decisions to be based on poor data, which can have detrimental effects on your business that not only affect the present, but set up for future missed opportunities and mistakes to be made.
- Increased Security Threats: Not conducting security audits is only leaving your company more vulnerable to attacks. Cyberattack methods are only increasing and evolving, not having security up to date on your data only increases the risk of a data breach more.
- Inefficient Data Operations: Audits identify where data is ineffective or redundant. Not having regular audits in place means there’s an increase in not only inefficiencies, but wasted resources and opportunities.
Strengthening Data Security After An Audit
There are several ways data security can be strengthened to protect your data after an audit. It’s important to deal with the vulnerabilities identified by the audit, but there are several additional practices that can be taken:
- Data Encryption: Having data encrypted both while resting and in transit protects data so that if a breach happens, the attackers will be unable to interpret the data.
- Multi-factor Authentication: Setting up multi-factor authentication protects data from unauthorized access a step further. If a password is compromised, the account attached is still not breached because additional steps are needed to get into the account that require the account holder to do.
- Increase Data Resilience: Having plans in place in the case of a data breach is important for data recovery. Having backups, proper data inventory, and an awareness of current industry threats are significant steps in doing so.