b'By Larry SpicerA DATA BREACHCAN COST YOUR JEWELRY BUSINESS MILLIONSHeres What You Need to KnowThe list of corporations that have fallen victim toHow many records were exposed?cyber-attacks continues to grow. The magnitudeObviously, this depends on the size of your business of the crimes committed continues to escalate asand the type of breach that occurs, but it will be the well. A research report* from Ponemon Instituteprimary driver of the costs. and IBM indicates that the average total cost of a data breach in 2020 was $3.8 million with theLets say the average jeweler gets five new customers average time to identify and contain a breach ata day and has that information over a five-year span. 280 days.That comes out to 9,125 records, which is near the amount mentioned above. Youre probably thinking the only organizationsBecause your business would also be responsible for those five years worth gettingbreachedareworthbillionsofdollarsof employees, contractors, and other business relationships, assume that and have just as many records. It would nevermore than your estimate has been compromised. Mounting costs will be less cost my business that muchplus, wed neversurprising if you err on the side of caution.be targeted by a hacker anyway. What type of data was exposed?Unfortunately, according to the Ponemon study,This breaks down to three possibilities: PHI, PCI, and you are more likely to experience a data breachPII. of at least 10,000 records (27.9%) than you are to catch the flu (5-20 %, according to WebMD).PHIstandsforPersonalHealthInformation.It doesnt really apply to a jewelry business (however, its Sophisticated hacking techniques arent the onlyimportant to be mindful of any employee data that falls under this category). method to qualify as a true data breach. Any event where personal or confidential informationPCI is short for Payment Card Information. The Payment Card Industry is lost or stolen can fit the definition. This includesSecurity Standard Council created the PCI Data Security Standard to securely human error, which by the way, is not limited tomanage data involved in financial transactions. However, since businesses the mistreatment of electronic data. If paper filesrun on the cash that they bring in from their customers, many organizations are stolen that contain sensitive information, thatare concerned with more than just a place to charge the bill. They want also constitutes a data breach. to know their customers more intimately, so they become loyal and make repeat purchases. This is where PII comes in.Theresreallynowayaroundit.Ifyourein business,youreexposedtodata.IfyourePersonal Identifiable Information (PII) includes PCI elements such as credit exposed to data, youre at risk for it to be stolencard information, but also includes literally everything else. Name, email, or lost. To properly protect your business, thebank account; you name it, PII covers iteven health records. PII breaches cost of that risk needs to be addressed. Hereare the most costly because they reveal so much and are able to connect an aresomequestionstoaskyourself,whichwillindividual to data points such as credit card numbers. While a stolen card ultimately influence four areas of costs specificnumber is bad enough, its even worse when a criminal knows everything to a data breach. else, as identity theft is now a real issue.16 | The Jewelry Business Magazine'