Marriott Hotels fined £18.4m for data breach that hit millions
The UK’s data privacy watchdog has fined the Marriott Hotels chain £18.4m for a major data breach that may have affected up to 339 million guests. The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) said names, contact information, and passport details may all have been compromised in a cyber-attack. The breach included seven million guest records for people […]
Cybersecurity: One in three attacks are coronavirus-related
The UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) is ‘stepping up support’ for the National Health Service to help protect UK hospitals and other healthcare organisations against cyberattacks. The NCSC’s Annual Review 2020 reveals that the cyber arm of GCHQ has handled more 200 cyber incidents related to coronavirus during the course of this year – almost a […]
How a remote workforce is shifting priorities
The pandemic has accelerated the move to digital transformation, forcing IT and cybersecurity teams to evaluate how they work to ensure that organizations remain secure. In particular, challenges have included the widespread adoption of hardware packages but also guaranteeing that employees have 24/7 access to their organizations’ IT infrastructure and files that are essential to work. When reflecting on […]
Huawei equipment must be removed from UK’s 5G networks by 2025
Stating there is clear evidence of collusion between Huawei and the Chinese state, the Parliament’s Defence Committee has recommended that Huawei-supplied equipment should be removed from the UK’s 5G networks by 2025 instead of 2027 which is the existing deadline. The Parliament’s Defence Committee is chaired by Conservative MP Tobias Elwood and other MPs in […]
BA GDPR Data Breach Fine Lowered to £20m Due to COVID-19
The fine against British Airways for GDPR failings has been reduced to £20m from the original £183m intent to fine issued last July. An ICO investigation found the airline was processing a significant amount of personal data without adequate security measures in place, leading to a cyber-attack during 2018, which it did not detect for more than two months. […]
Microsoft steps up Teams: Finally, the next generation of remote conferencing
This week, I attended Microsoft Ignite, and one of the sessions that caught my attention involved Microsoft Teams. The video conferencing market has been gravitating to two main offerings of late: Teams and Zoom. Large companies often use Teams, while Zoom is more common with smaller companies, charities and individuals. Let’s talk about video conferencing, both from […]
Remote working is driving a wedge between employees and IT support
Extended remote working could be driving a wedge between workers and IT teams, who continue to lack visibility over large swathes of the remote workforce, new research suggests. With recent findings from Gartner revealing that nearly half (47%) of all organizations will continue to embrace a fully remote workforce beyond COVID-19, mobile management software firm NetMotion set […]
21% of UK Workers Feel More Vulnerable to Cybercrime During COVID-19
More than one in five (21%) UK workers feel more vulnerable to cybercrime since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new study by PwC. Stress or fatigue was the most common factor (35%) cited by those workers, followed by lack of skills and training to stay safe from cybercrime whilst working from home […]
Ransomware Tops 2020 Threat Rankings
Ransomware was the most observed threat in 2020, according to a global corporate investigations and risk consulting firm based in New York City. Kroll‘s proprietary data on cyber incident response cases shows that ransomware attacks accounted for over one-third of all cases as of September 1, 2020. While this particular form of malware has struck […]
H&M Fined €35.2m for GDPR Violations
The world’s second-biggest fashion retailer was today handed a monumental fine for violating the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). A German subsidiary of Hennes & Mauritz AB (H&M) was fined €35,258,707.95 by regulatory body the Hamburg Data Protection Authority (HmbBfDI) for excessive use of employee data. H&M employs around 126,000 people globally. The fine imposed […]