In 2024, the number of data compromises in the United States stood at 3,158 cases. Meanwhile, over 1.35 billion individuals were affected in the same year by data compromises, including data breaches, leakage, and exposure. While these are three different events, they have one thing in common. As a result of all three incidents, the sensitive data is accessed by an unauthorized threat actor. Industries most vulnerable to data breaches Some industry sectors usually see more significant cases of private data violations than others. This is determined by the type and volume of the personal information organizations of these sectors store. In 2024 the financial services, healthcare, and professional services were the three industry sectors that recorded most data breaches. Overall, the number of healthcare data breaches in some industry sectors in the United States has gradually increased within the past few years. However, some sectors saw decrease. Largest data exposures worldwide In 2020, an adult streaming website, CAM4, experienced a leakage of nearly 11 billion records. This, by far, is the most extensive reported data leakage. This case, though, is unique because cyber security researchers found the vulnerability before the cyber criminals. The second-largest data breach is the Yahoo data breach, dating back to 2013. The company first reported about one billion exposed records, then later, in 2017, came up with an updated number of leaked records, which was three billion. In March 2018, the third biggest data breach happened, involving India’s national identification database Aadhaar. As a result of this incident, over 1.1 billion records were exposed.

During the third quarter of 2024, data breaches exposed more than *** million records worldwide. Since the first quarter of 2020, the highest number of data records were exposed in the first quarter of ***, more than *** million data sets. Data breaches remain among the biggest concerns of company leaders worldwide. The most common causes of sensitive information loss were operating system vulnerabilities on endpoint devices. Which industries see the most data breaches? Meanwhile, certain conditions make some industry sectors more prone to data breaches than others. According to the latest observations, the public administration experienced the highest number of data breaches between 2021 and 2022. The industry saw *** reported data breach incidents with confirmed data loss. The second were financial institutions, with *** data breach cases, followed by healthcare providers. Data breach cost Data breach incidents have various consequences, the most common impact being financial losses and business disruptions. As of 2023, the average data breach cost across businesses worldwide was **** million U.S. dollars. Meanwhile, a leaked data record cost about *** U.S. dollars. The United States saw the highest average breach cost globally, at **** million U.S. dollars.

As of December 2024, the most significant data breach incident in the United States was the Yahoo data breach that dates back to 2013-2016. Impacting over three billion online users, this incident still remains one of the most significant data breaches worldwide. The second-biggest case was the January 2021 data breach at Microsoft, involving about 30 thousand companies in the United States and around 60 thousand companies around the world.

Between the first quarter of 2021 and the first quarter of 2024, the number of data compromise cases in the United States increased significantly. The highest number of data compromises was recorded in the fourth quarter of 2023, with 1,089 cases. However, the number of recorded cases fell to 841 in the first quarter of 2024. In the fourth quarter of 2022, more than 253 million individuals were affected by data compromise incidents. By the first quarter of 2024, this number decreased to around 28.5 million.

The largest reported data leakage as of January 2025 was the Cam4 data breach in March 2020, which exposed more than 10 billion data records. The second-largest data breach in history so far, the Yahoo data breach, occurred in 2013. The company initially reported about one billion exposed data records, but after an investigation, the company updated the number, revealing that three billion accounts were affected. The National Public Data Breach was announced in August 2024. The incident became public when personally identifiable information of individuals became available for sale on the dark web. Overall, the security professionals estimate the leakage of nearly three billion personal records. The next significant data leakage was the March 2018 security breach of India's national ID database, Aadhaar, with over 1.1 billion records exposed. This included biometric information such as identification numbers and fingerprint scans, which could be used to open bank accounts and receive financial aid, among other government services.

Cybercrime - the dark side of digitalization As the world continues its journey into the digital age, corporations and governments across the globe have been increasing their reliance on technology to collect, analyze and store personal data. This, in turn, has led to a rise in the number of cyber crimes, ranging from minor breaches to global-scale attacks impacting billions of users – such as in the case of Yahoo. Within the U.S. alone, 1802 cases of data compromise were reported in 2022. This was a marked increase from the 447 cases reported a decade prior. The high price of data protection As of 2022, the average cost of a single data breach across all industries worldwide stood at around 4.35 million U.S. dollars. This was found to be most costly in the healthcare sector, with each leak reported to have cost the affected party a hefty 10.1 million U.S. dollars. The financial segment followed closely behind. Here, each breach resulted in a loss of approximately 6 million U.S. dollars - 1.5 million more than the global average.

Between May 2018 and September 2024, France saw eight incidents of significant data breaches. The first recorded case was the May 2018 data breach at Apollo.io. The marketing company based in San Francisco lost approximately 10.93 million data records from French users. The latest reported data breach incident occurred at the France-based security company Thales. As a result of this incident, 9.5 GB of archive files were leaked.

Since the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) implementation Europe-wide on the 25th of May 2018, the highest number of personal data breaches as of January 2024 were reported in the Netherlands, a total of around 139,625. The Netherlands ranked second, with more than 137,669 personal data breach notifications.

As of 2024, the mean number of days to identify the data breaches was *** days, four percent less than in the previous year. The mean time companies needed to contain the breaches in 2024 was ** days. In comparison, in 2022, it took organizations *** days to identify and ** days to address the data breaches.

Between January and September 2024, healthcare organizations in the United States saw 491 large-scale data breaches, resulting in the loss of over 500 records. This figure has increased significantly in the last decade. To date, the highest number of large-scale data breaches in the U.S. healthcare sector was recorded in 2023, with a reported 745 cases.

Data breaches cost companies considerably less had they deployed security automation. In 2024, a data breach cost an organization that extensively used security automation 3.84 million U.S. dollars on average, compared to 5.72 million U.S. dollars on average for an organization with no such deployment.

As of February 2024, the United States ranked first by the average cost of a data breach, 9.36 million U.S. dollars. The average cost of data breaches in the Middle East is 8.75 million U.S. dollars. Benelux followed in the ranking, with 5.9 million U.S. dollars. In the measured period, the global average data breach cost was 4.88 million U.S. dollars. Phishing scams in the U.S. Breached data often ends up in the hands of threat actors who use it for malicious purposes, including online scams. Phishing continues to be a major threat in North America, particularly on smartphones. In the second quarter of 2023, the region recorded the highest number of phishing and malicious attack attempts globally. The United States was particularly affected, with 45 percent of U.S. citizens reporting being targeted by scam texts, e-mails, and calls on a daily basis. Additionally, phishing and spoofing were the most common types of cybercrime, impacting 298 thousand individuals in 2023. These attacks led to financial losses, with U.S. victims reporting nearly 20 billion U.S. dollars in damages throughout the year. U.S. users and data privacy Despite only 20 percent of internet users in the United States being highly knowledgeable about data privacy and cybersecurity, a significant portion of users demonstrated caution and awareness in protecting their information. In fact, over half of surveyed U.S. users reported being somewhat confident in knowing the right steps to take in the event of a cyberattack. Furthermore, 43 percent of U.S. users actively decline cookies on websites, reflecting their increasing concern for data protection. Many respondents also take additional steps to safeguard their digital privacy, such as limiting or avoiding clicking on ads as well as not answering phone calls due to cybersecurity risks.

A survey conducted in May 2024 found that 56 percent of the respondents in the United States were not likely at all to trust a company that had experienced data breaching with their personal data. The same trend was reflected among different age groups, as the majority of them were not likely to trust companies post-data breach. A significant share of 76 percent of adults between the age of 45 and 54 were not likely to share their personal information with a company after a data breach. While approximately half of users aged between 25 and 44 were not at all likely to trust such companies in the future.

As of January 2024, about ** percent of organizations in the United Kingdom reported experiencing a data breach accident once a month. A further ** percent said they had encountered a data breach event less than once a month in the past 12 months. Meanwhile, ** percent said they had experienced a data breach incident once a week.

As of February 2024, the global average cost per data breach amounted to **** million U.S. dollars, an increase from **** million U.S. dollars in the previous year. The average cost of a data breach varied across sectors, with the highest average cost in the healthcare industry.

Customers' personal identifiable information was the most common type of data compromised in worldwide data breaches. ** percent of compromised records fell into this category in 2024. The second-most breached kind of data was employee personal identifiable information, with around ** percent of all breached records in the same year.

In 2024, the average cost of an industrial data breach reached its peak with an average of 5.56 million U.S. dollars, up from 4.73 million U.S. dollars in 2023. In comparison, the global average cost of a data breach across all studied industries was 4.88 million U.S. dollars.

Incidents of data breaches in the Philippines reached roughly 0.7 million during the fourth quarter of 2024, indicating a decrease from the previous quarter. The number of data breaches peaked in the second quarter of 2020 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Challenges in cybersecurity As one of the countries in Asia with a high internet penetration, Filipino online users have been surfing the web to access social media and other entertainment platforms. Recently, particularly at the height of the global pandemic, Filipino internet users also adopted online shopping and digital payment services for their essential and non-essential needs. With the increased digitalization of most services comes the heightened risk of being a victim of cyber threats such as phishing, online scams, data theft, and mobile malware. Such incidents were especially prominent among users lacking cyber hygiene or those unaware of how to protect their personal information when doing their online transactions. Cybersecurity market insights Despite the increased risks of online threats in the Philippines, the cybersecurity market remains modest compared to other countries. In particular, the Philippines ranked 12th out of 14 among countries in the Asia-Pacific region regarding the size of its cybersecurity market and was forecast to grow to about 344 million U.S. dollars in 2028.

Between the second quarter of 2022 and the third quarter of 2024, the number of records exposed to account breaches in Thailand fluctuated significantly. Over 690,000 datasets were reported as having been leaked in the third quarter of 2024, compared to around 166,000 during the same quarter of the previous year.

As of May 2024, over half of adults in the United States reported having no interest in dealing with companies that have experienced data breaches in the past. In contrast, only nine percent of adult users in the U.S. said they are very likely to trust a company that has had a data leak.

A survey conducted in the United Kingdom (UK) from September 2023 to January 2024 found that around 13 percent of businesses that had identified a data breach incident or a cyberattack in the preceding 12 months had seen at least one outcome after the incident. The most common were the situations where the website or online services were taken down or made slower and the temporary loss of access to files or networks.