Page 79 - Cyber Defense eMagazine April 2021 Edition

Half of SMBs Have Experienced a Website Breach

There’s no sugar-coating it. 50 percent of SMBs experienced a website breach, and 20% of our sample
experienced one just in the past 12 months. And these are the ones who even know they were breached!
The actual numbers are likely significantly higher. If you’re in FinServ, things look even more dire, with 52%
of SMBs with reported breaches in the past year. Worse yet, in China, 66% of SMBs say that their website
was breached in the past year. I think we can all agree that website breaches are far too common.
The Impact of Website Breaches Is Severe

Websites today are the face of the business to most customers and increasingly drives a significant portion
of revenue. 54 percent of SMBs say there would be a serious impact on their business if their website went
down, and 72% say they collect or store sensitive data through their website. Not long ago, a breach that
compromises personal information like credit card information and social security numbers would have made
headlines.

Now, it’s so common we don’t always hear about it happening. The impact of these breaches, regardless of
whether they constitute a top news story, is severe. 28 percent of those who had been breached said the
consequences were severe or very severe. The top three impacts were website outages or downtime, loss of
time/employee productivity, and loss of customer confidence/reputation. And as most business owners know,
any of these impacts can lead to lost opportunities for more sales.

#1 Impact: Website Outages or
Downtime

Your website is often your business’
first impression, how you connect with
your customers, and how you make
sales or give information - 24/7/365,
even when you’re asleep. But your
online business is entirely unavailable
during a website outage, and
customers land on dead pages or are
even redirected to malicious content.
In most cases, if your website is down,
your online business comes to a
screeching halt. Leads stop coming in,
there are no transactions, and ads are
wasted. In the era of COVID, when the
means of doing business hinges on a
seamless online experience–outages
aren’t an option. Of SMB websites that
were breached, 60% of attacks
resulted in site outages.

79 Cyber Defense eMagazine – April 2021 Edition
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