Konica Minolta warns that around 90% of SMBs are risking significant fines and reputational damage through serious IT vulnerabilities and data management weaknesses. The statistic comes from the company’s managed IT support services, giving a snapshot of the potential dangers to IT security amongst UK organisations.
Francis Thornhill, Head of Customer & Solutions Marketing, said: “Security compliance is a key area of our assessments and whilst some businesses have seen good results, many others are lacking the right protection which is concerning – and 90% had at least one significant gap. Potential liability is an area that no business wants to face. One business we worked with was potentially facing £15m of fines, whilst another was risking an eye-watering £35m had it fallen foul of the regulator before making our suggested changes. Yet fines are only really part of the risk to business – the greatest risk is damage to trust and reputation with customers as well as complete business operations failure if systems and data can’t be recovered.”
Konica Minolta’s findings are amplified by statistics released by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) that reveal 68% of medium-sized UK firms suffered a cyber security breach or attack during the past 12 months.
