The number of U.S. data breaches bumped up 17% in 2019 but despite the increase, the volume of sensitive consumer records that were exposed declined substantially by 65%, according to a newly published report.
These statistics are a complete reversal of what happened in 2018, when the number of exposed consumer records soared by 126% and breaches declined by 23%, according to the Identity Theft Resource Center’s (ITRC) End-of-Year Data Breach Report for 2019
Data breaches tracked in 2019 in the United States jumped to 1,473, from 1,257 in the previous year, the report revealed. Meanwhile, 164,683,455 sensitive records were exposed, compared to 471,225,862 in 2018. The ITRC notes, however, that the 2018 Marriott data alone exposed 383 million records, which is more than 80% of the total number and, “significantly skewing the data.”
With that in mind, it’s important to put what happened in 2018 into context, according to ITRC President and CEO Eva Velasquez. “The increase in the number of data breaches during 2019, while not surprising, is a serious issue,” she said. “It would appear that 2018 was an anomaly in how many data breaches were reported and the number of records exposed. The 2019 reporting year sees a return to the pattern of the ever-increasing number of breaches and volume of records exposed.”
Based on that analysis, what appears to be a good news/bad news story turns into more of a cautionary tale. But Matt Cullina, Executive Vice President of Strategic Partnerships and Managing Director of Global Markets at CyberScout, took heart in the reduction of the number of exposed sensit ..
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