British businesses are continuing to battle an onslaught of credit and debit card data breaches, with a stolen card used every 20 seconds last month, according to payments processor Worldpay.
Its records show that there were over 133,000 fraudulent transactions worth £10 million in March alone.
Small businesses were once again found to have made up the bulk of breach investigations, accounting for 86% of all card data breaches.
The majority of all unauthorised transactions (67%) occurred online, whilst purchases carried out over the phone or by mail made up 19% of the total.
Tim Lansdale, head of payment security at Worldpay, said technology to protect businesses from such attacks continues to evolve, but it appears to have done little to diminish “truly alarming” rates of attack.
He highlighted how fraudsters have recognised that businesses and consumers alike struggle to protect themselves against card data breaches and continue exploit this vulnerability.
Businesses that choose not to put the necessary security in place to protect their payment systems must absorb not only the cost of goods purchased using stolen card details but also the cost of any subsequent investigation into the breach, Lansdale explained.
He added that there are also “stiff” industry penalties placed at the feet of affected businesses – not to mention the bad publicity which inevitably ensues.
A typical small business forensic investigation into a card data breach costs £11,250 on average, with a further industry penalty of around £8,000 also being imposed.
Lansdale says that companies have a responsibility to do all they can to prevent being hacked.
“Businesses of all shapes and sizes should be taking the necessary measures to protect themselves and their customers and employees,” he said.
Source: Wordplay
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