Online security breaches in 2014 increased by 48 percent from 2013, said a study released by PricewaterhouseCoopers. It was based on responses from 9,700 industry executives in 154 countries, it said, 35 percent from North America. Respondents said they had 42.8 million security breaches in 2014, or 117,339 attacks per day, it said. The study included “only the total incidents detected and reported,” it said. “The number of respondents reporting losses of $20 million or more almost doubled over 2013.” A separate survey, also released Monday from Kaspersky Lab, said 94 percent of companies had cybersecurity issues in 2014, a 3 percentage point increase from last year. Kaspersky partnered with B2B International on the survey, which covered 3,900 respondents from companies of all sizes in 27 countries, it said. The survey was done from April 2013 to May 2014, it said. The average cost of one data security incident was estimated to be $720,000, it said. Thirty-eight percent of companies said that “protection of confidential data against leakages” is their top priority, it said. Twelve percent of companies were the victims of targeted data security attacks, up from 9 percent last year, it said.
The “potential” for data breaches “grows apace as the number of connected devices multiplies,” said FTC Chairwoman Edith Ramirez in remarks prepared for Monday's Internet of Things Global Summit. “The risks those breaches pose intensify as we adopt more and more devices linked to our physical safety, such as our cars, our medical care, and our homes.” The FTC is “concerned that some companies are underinvesting in security,” said Ramirez. “We’ve found that some organizations fail to take even the most basic security precautions, such as updating antivirus software or requiring network administrators to use strong passwords.” Data security should be built into a company’s devices from the “outset, not as an afterthought,” she said. Data collectors should “follow the principle of data minimization,” which would limit data collection for a “specific purpose," said Ramirez. Companies should also “appropriately de-identify consumer data,” she said. “Those handling data should give consumers simplified choices for unexpected collection or uses of their data,” Ramirez said. “Transparency” is the most important goal for data collectors, she said. Privacy policies for businesses are “broken,” she said. “Too many companies use them primarily as tools to shield themselves from liability,” said Ramirez: “This must change.” She said such policies should “clearly lay out what data is being collected, how it is being used, and with whom it will be shared.” The FTC last week commended the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration for taking privacy and security concerns into account, in a rulemaking on vehicle-to-vehicle communication capability for passenger cars and light trucks (see 1410240027).
Zebra Technologies completed its $3.45 billion purchase of Motorola Solutions’ enterprise unit, Zebra CEO Anders Gustafsson said in a Monday news release. The deal, disclosed in April, will allow Zebra to “provide the building blocks of Internet of Things solutions, as customers worldwide increasingly take advantage of data analytics and mobility to improve business performance,” Gustafsson said. Some 4,500 Motorola Solutions employees will transfer to Zebra, the company said.
The percentage of U.S. households that get broadband service at home increased from 20 percent in 2004 to 79 percent this year, a Leichtman Research Group survey found. Adults reported spending an average of 2.8 hours online at home a day, up from 2.2 hours per day in 2009, said a Friday Leichtman news release (http://bit.ly/1ruAw9b). Those aged 18 to 34 spent an average of 3.3 hours online at home daily, compared with 2.1 hours daily among those aged 55 and older, the release said. It said 63 percent of adults get Internet on a smartphone, up from 44 percent in 2012. The findings are based on a phone survey of 1,261 households in September.
The average bandwidth of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks increased 389 percent between Q3 2013 and Q3 2014, Akamai Technologies said Thursday in a report (http://bit.ly/1FKpy9i). Akamai said its service defended against 17 DDoS attacks in Q3 that had traffic of more than 100 Gbps, including one at 321 Gbps. “We witnessed none of that size in the same quarter a year ago and only six” in Q2, said John Summers, Akamai vice president-Security Business Unit, in a news release. “These mega-attacks each used multiple DDoS vectors to deliver large bandwidth-consuming packets at an extremely high rate of speed.” More than half of all attacks measured in Q3 used multiple attack vectors, an 11 percent increase from Q2 and a 9 percent increase from the same period last year, Akamai said. Multi-vector attacks are increasing due to “the increased availability of attack toolkits with easy-to-use interfaces as well as a growing DDoS-for-hire criminal industry,” Akamai said (http:// bit.ly/1xenfVC).
The Information Technology Industry Council (ITI) is “seeing the right trends illustrating that the marketplace is accepting” Version 1.0 of the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s (NIST) Cybersecurity Framework, said Danielle Kriz, director-global cybersecurity policy, in a blog post (http://bit.ly/1rpPQmz). ITI was one of several information and communications technology (ICT) sector participants that submitted comments to NIST on industry use of the framework, which the agency released in February (see 1410140173). Companies in the ICT sector “are having new conversations about cybersecurity risk management” and the market is responding with new products and services to manage cyber risks outside the sector, Kriz said. ITI said it is urging NIST to “pivot away from developing a framework or standard and focus its work on” on its Privacy Engineering Objectives and Risk Model, which is meant to address gaps in privacy-related technical best practices. “Such a resource would be useful to organizations seeking to improve how they build privacy into their information management structures,” Kriz said. ITI suggested NIST seek out additional comment on the Cybersecurity Framework in a year’s time.
Netflix has competed head to head against the HBO Nordic streaming service for nearly two years in the same four European markets, but the lessons learned there won’t necessarily be applicable to the U.S. when HBO launches its streaming service in 2015 (see 1410150095), Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said on a YouTube Q&A Wednesday with two analysts. HBO Nordic, available in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden, launched in December 2012 as a joint venture with Parsifal International, the Swedish-based pay-TV provider. That’s about the same time Netflix debuted its streaming service in those same four markets. Asked to speculate how the HBO streaming service in the U.S. might be priced and distributed when it ultimately comes out, Hastings recalled that when HBO Nordic launched two years ago, it "chose to price on top of our pricing." Hastings cautioned that pricing overall in the Nordic countries is higher overall than in the U.S. because of the European valued-added tax and a higher cost of living. "So it's not definitely indicative" of the competitive price structure that could come into play in the U.S. when HBO launches its streaming service next year, he said. "But they've been quite aggressive in the Nordics and we stayed well ahead," Hastings said. Later in the Q&A, Hastings again cautioned against reading too much into the Nordic experience in predicting how HBO and Netflix might go head to head in the U.S. "Each market is unique," Hastings said. When HBO Nordic launched, it encountered "some teething problems initially two years ago that they probably would not have in the U.S.," he said. "I think they've been licensing broadly," including having recently licensing "a number" of Starz titles, he said. "So they're willing to license beyond their core platform. They've done pretty well, and we've done very well." Hastings is looking forward to a "fun" period the next few years when "the two of us compete for the best content, the most Emmys, the subscriber growth," he said. "And many, many people will subscribe to both services. So we're looking forward to that. We're just excited that HBO is really in the game with the Internet. They're the leader in their field. They're well ahead of their peer-group. They're ahead of the broadcast networks in this dimension, so it's exciting to see." HBO representatives didn’t immediately comment. Asked to elaborate on the Hastings comment that HBO Nordic incurred "teething problems" when it launched two years ago, Netflix spokesman Don Halcombe emailed us Thursday to say the company would have "nothing to add."
The U.S. market revenue for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) will grow to $15 billion in 2020 from $5 billion last year, an IGI Consulting report said. Growth will be driven by the commercial and the “do-it-yourself” markets, IGI said in a news release. Fiber optic technology, developed for telecom, has a wide range of possible uses in the UAV field, the report said (http://bit.ly/1ve3grV). Fiber offers small size and weight with a potential for low cost, it said. Regulation is the biggest burden for UAV growth, the report said. “The only way the regulators will act is through political pressure” from “big hitters,” such as Apple, Amazon and Google, it said. Federal agencies, like the FCC, Federal Aviation Administration and NTIA, have the potential to foster growth in the UAV civil market, IGI said.
While some mobile banking users claimed to have no major concerns about mobile banking, more than 56 percent said they have fears when accessing their bank information on smartphones, a GOBankingRates study found. About 37 percent of smartphone users polled cited identity theft as a major concern, and almost 9 percent were worried about technical errors, GOBankingRates said Tuesday (http://bit.ly/1nmcjp1). Women were 65 percent more likely than men to worry about technical errors resulting in missing funds, it said. Men were 85 percent more likely than women to be worried about lack of paper statements, and 37 percent more likely to be concerned with misuse of information, it said. “Respondents in the Northeast and South were more concerned with identity theft than those in the West and Midwest.” To obtain the information, GOBankingRates surveyed 790 Americans, it said.
General Motors weighed in at the FCC, raising concerns about proposals that the agency subject mobile broadband to the same rules as fixed as it moves forward on net neutrality regulations. GM said it has a real stake in the issue since it's building technology into cars so they can offer a built-in vehicle hot spot. Mobile broadband in a car moving at 75 miles down a highway or stuck in a traffic jam is “fundamentally different” from a wired connection to a consumer’s home and “merits continued consideration under distinct rules that take this into account,” GM said. The FCC can't “define exceptions for ‘reasonable network management’ for circumstances it can’t imagine,” GM said. GM said the future holds a promise of continuing innovation for cars and mobile broadband. “We urge the Commission to preserve the regulatory environment that can continue to foster this,” GM said. FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler has hinted repeatedly that mobile broadband will be subject to the same rules as fixed, but with an exception allowing carriers to engage in “reasonable network management.”