OTA Releases Data Protection, Breach Readiness Guide

“Now is the time to support comprehensive legislation to help protect personal and corporate data, promote security best practices and encourage the sharing of threat intelligence,” Online Trust Alliance Executive Director Craig Spiezle said in a statement on the release of OTA’s data protection and breach readiness guide Wednesday. The report includes a template with recommended language organizations should use when notifying the public of a data breach, details on why sharing information about breached data with law enforcement is important, security best practices, and reasons it’s important to complete security and privacy assessments and audits of vendors and cloud providers. “To maintain a competitive advantage over today’s cyber criminals, it is critical that the public and private sector continue to proactively leverage the power of task force partnerships,” said Robert Kierstead, Secret Service special agent in charge, Seattle Field Office. “Our continuing success in high-tech investigations is a result of the collaborative efforts of law enforcement and private sector partners." The OTA guide will be presented at a Friday national cybersecurity open house, co-sponsored by the Department of Justice, FBI and Secret Service. The report findings include that 90 percent of data breaches that occurred in the first half of 2014 “could have been easily prevented,” and 40 percent of data breaches were the “result of external intrusions,” an OTA release said. “The pillars of data security are digital literacy, up-to-date awareness of threats and active security protocols,” said Timothy Wallach, supervisory special agent over the FBI Seattle Cyber Task Force. “Anyone who wants to protect themselves online needs to start with educating themselves in those areas, not once but continually.”