Data breaches cost Saudi, UAE firms $5.31 mln: report

The average total cost of a data breach in Saudi Arabia and the UAE combined rose7.1 percent  from last year to $5.31 million, IBM Security said in a new report.

Breaches cost reached an average $163 per lost or stolen record in the two countries, it added.

The primary reason for 61 percent of breaches was "malicious or criminal attacks", followed by "system glitches" at 21 percent and "human error" at 18 percent.

“We are living in an age of exponential change with more data, connected devices and computing power than ever before. While this offers businesses tremendous opportunities, it also creates more ways for potential data breaches within an organization,” said Dr Tamer Aboualy, CTO of security services, IBM Middle East & Africa.

According to the report, the average time to identify a data breach was 260 days in the two countries, while the average time to contain a data breach once identified was 91 days.

Meanwhile, the IBM report revealed that financial services, services and technology in Saudi Arabia and UAE topped the list as the most expensive industries for data breaches, costing organizations $219, $201 and $188 per record, respectively.

One major factor impacting the cost of a data breach was "cost of lost business," which amounted to $2.2 million.

“While data breach costs have been rising steadily over the history of the study, we see positive signs of cost savings through the use of newer technologies as well as proper planning for incident response, which can significantly reduce these costs,” said Dr Larry Ponemon, chairman and founder of Ponemon Institute, which conducted the survey.