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Online Banking “Cybersecurity Incidents” Cost Bankers an Average 1.75 Mil, Kaspersky Says

A cybersecurity incident involving a bank’s online banking services could cost the organization $1,754,000 on average, according to a  new report by cybersecurity firm Kaspersky has found.

The Kaspersky Lab report on the financial sector shows that such cybersecurity incidents cost double the price of recovering from a malware incident, which costs as much as $825,000 on average to resolve.

The study shows that 61 percent of cybersecurity incidents affecting online banking come with additional costs for the institution targeted – including data loss, the loss of brand/company reputation, confidential information becoming leaked, and more. These findings uncover the cost implications of cybersecurity threats for financial institutions to consider and put appropriate measures in place to protect themselves and their customers from incidents involving online banking – particularly from DDoS attacks.

DDoS attacks against financial institutions are often designed to cripple banking websites. The report shows that when organizations are attacked by DDoS, customer-facing resources suffer more in banking, than in any other sector. For example, 49 percent of banks that have suffered a DDoS attack have had their public website affected (compared to 41% of non-financial institutions) and 48 percent have had their online banking services affected when they’ve been targeted by DDoS.

Banks typically worry about attacks against their online banking services more than about many other threats. However, it’s surprising that DDoS attacks, according to the report, only rank third place, being superseded by concerns about malware and targeted attacks, despite the fact that DDoS is more costly to recover from than a malware attack.

Recovering from a DDoS attack is also more expensive for banks than non-financial organizations. The report shows that a DDoS incident can cost a financial institution $1,172,000 to recover from, compared to $952,000 for businesses in other sectors.

With the most feared consequence of a cyber incident being the loss of brand/company reputation for almost one-in-five (17%) financial institutions, Kaspersky Lab urges businesses in the sector to be more aware of the dangers they face, to protect their services, customers and brands from harm.

“In the banking sector reputation is everything, and security goes hand-in-hand with this,” said Kirill Ilganaev, head of Kaspersky DDoS protection, Kaspersky Lab. “If a bank’s online services come under attack, it is very difficult for customers to trust that bank with their money, so it’s easy to see why an attack could be so crippling. If banks are to protect themselves effectively from the price tag of an online banking cybersecurity incident, they first need to become more prepared for the dangers DDoS attacks pose to their online banking services. This threat should be featuring higher on banks’ security priorities.”

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