{"id":22959,"date":"2020-10-01T09:21:03","date_gmt":"2020-10-01T09:21:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.heartinternet.uk\/blog\/?p=22959"},"modified":"2020-10-01T09:21:03","modified_gmt":"2020-10-01T09:21:03","slug":"cyber-security-month-2020-why-its-more-essential-than-ever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.heartinternet.uk\/blog\/cyber-security-month-2020-why-its-more-essential-than-ever\/","title":{"rendered":"Cyber Security Month 2020: Why it\u2019s more essential than ever"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today marks the start of Cyber Security Month, which runs for the whole of October. Approximately 40 countries will be marking the event with talks, seminars, workshops and activities designed to promote cyber security and encourage the sharing of good practices.<\/p>\n

The theme for National Cyber Security Month in the USA, where the event first launched back in 2004, is \u2018Do your part, be cyber smart\u2019.<\/p>\n

The European Cyber Security Month focus, meanwhile, is \u2018Cyber security is a shared responsibility\u2019, emphasizing the involvement and collaboration needed from governments, businesses, and individuals.<\/p>\n

During the course of this month, the Heart Internet blog will be posting a series of articles on all kinds of cyber security topics.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll be able to find out more about two factor authentication, read up on protecting your email addresses, and expand your knowledge in lots of other areas too.<\/p>\n

To kick things off, we\u2019re looking at how this year\u2019s unprecedented events have shaped the cyber security landscape. Plus, we\u2019re explaining why implementing the advice of Cyber Security Month has never been so essential.<\/p>\n

The cyber security situation before COVID-19<\/strong><\/p>\n

Data breaches were an everyday occurrence in 2019. One report suggests that, during the first half of the year alone, 3,813 breaches<\/a> took place. Together, they exposed a whopping 4.1 billion records.<\/p>\n

As part of their Cyber Security Breaches Survey 2019, the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport discovered that 20 per cent<\/a> of UK companies had been subjected to breaches or attacks during 2019. For large businesses, this number rose to 61 per cent.<\/p>\n

Governments weren\u2019t exempt from criminal cyber activity, either. In the UK, the Labour Party fell victim to two large-scale distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks against them in the space of two days. And across the pond, an attack on the government of New Orleans was so ferocious it caused them to declare a state of emergency.<\/p>\n

Despite the frequency and severity of attacks taking place in 2019, though, it\u2019s thought that only a third of companies have robust cyber security policies in place.<\/p>\n

The impact of COVID-19 on cyber security<\/strong><\/p>\n

In a recent report, the Deloitte Cyber Intelligence Centre revealed there has been a spike<\/a> in phishing attacks, malspams and ransomware attacks since the COVID-19 pandemic started.<\/p>\n

These are some of the main causes of this increase in attacks:<\/p>\n