Data Leaks & Account Takeovers: Would your business survive the financial and legal consequences?

While most businesses are well aware that it’s in their best interests to protect the personal data they have in their possession, many severely underestimate the consequences of losing that data.

A data leak isn’t just an unfortunate event resulting in a few days of bad PR, a few lost customers, and perhaps a slap on the wrist from some regulatory authorities. In fact, losing control over your data or your user accounts could be an existential threat to your business.

Oh, and a major data leak could also turn into a career calamity: A 2020 IBM report found that 46% of those surveyed said the CISO/CSO is ultimately held responsible for a breach, even though only 27% believe the CISO/CSO is the security policy and technology decision-maker.

Here are only a few of the most important financial and legal consequences of data leaks and account takeovers:

• GDPR & CCPA Penalties
• Litigation Costs
• Damage to Reputation
• Loss of intellectual Property

Luckily, many of these risks can be significantly reduced or even eliminated by implementing a solid protection system against bad bots. Indeed, these automated agents are responsible for many of the most serious security threats that online businesses are facing today.

Let’s take a closer look at each of the dangers listed above, and what you can do to protect your business (and your career) from data leaks.

Litigation Costs

Whether or not you’re found guilty of GDPR or CCPA non-compliance, the legal consequences (and costs) of a data breach may not stop there.

In 2017, hackers stole the personal data of almost 150 million US Equifax customers. A year later, consumers had filed 36,045 complaints. Of those surveyed who were aware of the data leak, 46.23% said that Equifax should have lost its ability to act as a credit bureau, which would effectively have put the company out of business. Dealing with these complaints will easily cost Equifax thousands of legal man-hours, and that’s not even counting the fines they’ve had to pay already.

Not that you need thousands of individual complaints. A continuous stream of individual lawsuits over data privacy is a drain on your company’s resources and, quite probably, your mental health. This is particularly true if you appeal a decision.

Legal fees are often little more than a side thought in our risk estimates, but they can easily turn into a financial burden you really don’t need.

Damage to Reputation

If malicious bots manage to gain access to the personal data you hold, legal penalties are just one of your many worries: there are many other types of potential damage, too. Loss of reputation (and future revenue) is a major one.

After a major data leak or successful account takeover attack, consumers won’t trust you anymore, and you can’t blame them. Imagine being an unsuspecting customer who suddenly discovers account cancellations, identity theft, or fraudulent credit card transactions after a data breach at your company. It will be extremely hard, if not impossible, to rebuild trust with that person.

And that’s not even talking about companies where trust is at the very center of their business model. Ashley Madison is a dating service marketed to people who are married or in a relationship. “Life is short, have an affair” is their slogan. Hackers gained access to their user database in 2015 and dumped the names, physical addresses, sexual preferences, and credit card data of 32 million Ashley Madison users on the dark web for anyone to see. The brand’s reputation collapsed and its website lost 80% of its traffic. Oops.

Loss of intellectual property

A fourth type of costly data loss is the theft of intellectual property. While web scraping can’t be considered a breach, since the data is typically publicly available, it’s still a form of data leak that may have significant financial consequences.

Saint-Gobain Distribution Bâtiment (SGDB) France is the leading distributor of construction materials in France. In its multiple online stores, the company sells products from a wide variety of manufacturers. Since many suppliers provide incomplete product data and documentation, SGDB has its own team responsible for supplementing and improving the vendor catalogs.

Providing buyers with the most complete product data is an important competitive advantage for SGDB, but the company discovered that scraper bots were harvesting the valuable data and publishing it on competitor websites.

This intellectual property theft represented a real business risk. SGDB put a stop to it by implementing the DataDome solution, which automatically blocks unwanted scraper bots. (This also had the side effect of reducing SGDB’s total traffic and associated operating costs by 12%, generating an immediate ROI). You can read the full case study here.

Prevent bot-driven data leaks and protect your sensitive data

Regulatory fines that easily go in the millions of dollars, costly litigations with consumers, the instant loss of hard-earned reputation or valuable intellectual property, and worse. The financial and legal consequences of data leaks are enough to make your head spin. How can you adequately protect yourself and prevent data leaks?

A bot protection solution will go a long way. A system that protects you in real time from even the most aggressive, most sophisticated credential stuffing attacks. A system that works with your existing tech infrastructure and can be installed in less than five minutes. In other words, the DataDome bot protection software.

The risks of devastating data leaks are real and pressing. Don’t fall into the mistake of believing they mostly apply to multinational conglomerates. Companies of every size are at risk. You’ll be okay until you’re suddenly not. Try DataDome free for 30 days to understand the threat you’re under.

Loss of Intellectual Property

A fourth type of costly data loss is the theft of intellectual property. While web scraping can’t be considered a breach, since the data is typically publicly available, it’s still a form of data leak that may have significant financial consequences.

Saint-Gobain Distribution Bâtiment (SGDB) France is the leading distributor of construction materials in France. In its multiple online stores, the company sells products from a wide variety of manufacturers. Since many suppliers provide incomplete product data and documentation, SGDB has its own team responsible for supplementing and improving the vendor catalogs.

Providing buyers with the most complete product data is an important competitive advantage for SGDB, but the company discovered that scraper bots were harvesting the valuable data and publishing it on competitor websites.

This intellectual property theft represented a real business risk. SGDB put a stop to it by implementing the DataDome solution, which automatically blocks unwanted scraper bots. (This also had the side effect of reducing SGDB’s total traffic and associated operating costs by 12%, generating an immediate ROI). You can read the full case study here.

Prevent bot-driven data leaks and protect your sensitive data.

Regulatory fines that easily go in the millions of dollars, costly litigations with consumers, the instant loss of hard-earned reputation or valuable intellectual property, and worse. The financial and legal consequences of data leaks are enough to make your head spin. How can you adequately protect yourself and prevent data leaks?

A bot protection solution will go a long way. A system that protects you in real time from even the most aggressive, most sophisticated credential stuffing attacks. A system that works with your existing tech infrastructure and can be installed in less than five minutes. In other words, the DataDome platform! DataDome Account Protect leverages additional behavioral signals to stop account fraud, regardless of whether it is driven by bots or humans.

The risks of devastating data leaks are real and pressing. Don’t fall into the mistake of believing they mostly apply to multinational conglomerates. Companies of every size are at risk. You’ll be okay until you’re suddenly not. Get started today with a free 30-day trial.