A 2020 study on US consumers and cybercrime recorded nearly 1,500 significant data breaches in 2019 resulting in the exposure of more than 164 million sensitive records. Meanwhile, one executive of a major US accounting firm argued that 2020 may be one of the most fraud-rich environments in our nation's history.
"It is as if a bank vault had been opened around the country and a welcome sign for crooks hung outside the door," Brad Preber, CEO of Grant Thornton LLP, told Business Insider, referring to loans issued under the CARES Act stimulus package.
If your company's data has been unlawfully released, it doesn't matter how many or how few records are exposed — every data breach is significant.
With sensitive data on the loose, it's hard to know how or even if it's possible to get your records back, especially once they've been offered for sale online. This enables bad actors to use personally identifying information, including social security numbers, addresses, and even passwords and logins, to do things like breach your customers' financial accounts, set up credit cards and other accounts in their names, and divert government payments, among other things.
GroupSense is one company that makes a business out of retrieving sensitive data for its clients, as well as patrolling the internet for potential cyber and real-time, in-person threats and protecting companies' principals from these threats. A privately-held company based in Arlington, Virginia, GroupSense told Business Insider that the company has experienced 65% year-over-year growth thanks to its growing customer base that includes large enterprises, state and municipal governments, and law enforcement agencies.
It attracts these customers in part because of the strength of its proprietary breach database, which the company said is the largest of its kind in the world given the comprehensive nature of the data it covers, which is carefully screened to ensure that there are no duplicates.
GroupSense took Business Insider behind the scenes to explain how its process works in ferreting out and rescuing valuable personally identifiable information (PII).
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