Accidental Insider Leaks Prove Major Source of Risk

While malicious insiders often make headlines, most enterprise data leaks are accidental — caused by end users who fail to follow corporate security policy or try to work around it.

The "2020 Cost of Insider Threats: Global Report" by Ponemon Institute found only 23% of insider incidents last year were caused by criminal or malicious insiders. Approximately 62% were caused by employee or contractor negligence. The remaining 14% came at the hands of credential thieves posing as insiders.

The unintentional insider threat is only expected to worsen. The recent "2021 Data Exposure Report" by Code42 found employees are now 85% more likely to leak sensitive files now than they were before COVID-19. Since the start of the pandemic, 61% of IT security leaders say their remote workforce was the cause of a data breach. 

Yet investment in this area does not keep pace. The Code42 research found more than half (54%) of IT security leaders spend less than 20% of their budget on insider risk, and 66% say their budget for insider risk is insufficient.

The Dark Reading Tech Insight "Detecting and Preventing Insider Data Leaks" examines the growing problem around unintentional insider data exposures and how security leaders are addressing the challenges around containing these risks.

Read the full report here.