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- One Nasty Cyber Lie We All Say
Power Up by Empath Cyber
In today's rundown:
š„ø One Nasty Lie Weāve All Said!
š„ But is that Lie Now Coming True?
š£ Hereās a Few Real Life Post-Breach Statements (And They Are Scary!)
š» Digital Attacks Result in Tangible Consequences
Read time: 6 minutes š
One Nasty Lie Weāve All Said!
Youāve heard this before, havenāt you? š
Weāre all guilty of saying this. I know I am. And at first it sounds scary. And it evokes a whole lot of fear. But hereās the problem: This statistic is completely made up! It has literally zero source of truth.
Do businesses shut down from a cyberattack? I mean, maybe. It does happen. But 60%? Come on now. All this does is create (or deepen) an adversarial relationship with the client. (Especially since itās a lie. š)
And clients just think: āI know a few people hit with a cyber attack. And they didnāt go out of business. This just sounds like scare tactics to me.ā
So whatās the alternative? Letās teach the client what a typical cyber attack would cost.
Think of it this way: if you tell a client a cyber attack will shut them down, theyāll think and consider how many businesses they know that have shut down. And that just leads them to thinking: āYou know, Iāll just save my money and take that risk. I canāt think of anyone that has shut down from an attack.ā
But helping a client understand why a cyber attack would commonly cost no less than $500k - $1M in average? Thatās a different story. (Of course, be prepared to explain why a breach might cost that much. š)
But is that Lie Now Coming True?
And as fate would have it, perhaps thereās a small nugget of truth to that fake news. Just this week, a non-profit hospital announced they are closing their doors in part due to a cyber attack.
But why? Why did a cyber attack lead to business loss? Letās connect the dots. Right from the article, NBC said:
The attack halted the hospitalās ability to submit claims to insurers, Medicare or Medicaid for months, sending it into a financial spiral.
Hospitals that fall victim to ransomware attacks often have to scramble to find ways to suddenly work without the computers that have become integral to modern health care. Health care workers can be forced to revert to pen and paper for patient charts and prescriptions, which has led to patientsā receiving incorrect medicine dosages and delayed operations. An attack can force ambulances to reroute to other hospitals.
This is how we get clients to care. Itās really not about the ransomware. Itās about the impact to the business. The inability for patient care. Forcing medical records to go on paper. Delays in reimbursements and insurance filing.
A literal disaster scenario. Thatās the impact. And this is something every MSP needs to be talking with their clients about.
Hereās a Few Real Life Post-Breach Statements (And They Are Scary!)
Sometimes what we need most isnāt data. We need impact. We need our clients to hear from those that have gone through a cyber attack. It can be a literal game changer.
So hereās a few statements from those impacted by the hospital shut down from the link above:
āI need access to good medical care at any given time,ā she said. āItās not like I can say Iāll schedule my stroke six months from now. Itās devastating to this area. If youāre having a heart attack or a stroke, may the odds ever be in your favor, because youāre not going to make it there in time,ā
Yikes. If that doesnāt impact change and investment in cybersecurity, Iām not sure much else will. Hereās another:
āYouāre dead in the water,ā she said. āWe were down a minimum of 14 weeks. And then youāre trying to recover. Nothing went out. No claims. Nothing got entered. So it took months and months and months."
Sometimes quotes like this go further than anything else. Feel free to use these in your conversations! Cyber attacks cost so much more than just the payment of a ransom. Business outages can spiral into an uncontrolled mess. Do your clients recognize this?
Digital Attacks Result in Tangible Consequences
Lastly, I think itās really important that we recognize that digital attacks very quickly overflow into the tangible, physical world. Look at this study data from Ponemon on the impact of ransomware in healthcare:
Two-thirds of respondents in the Ponemon study who had experienced ransomware attacks said they disrupted patient care, and 59% of them found they increased the length of patientsā stays, straining resources. Almost one-quarter said they led to increased mortality rates at their facilities.
Yikes. And I imagine this applies to all industries, not just healthcare. So once again, we owe it to our decision makers to inform them that so much is at stake here. Itās not theory. This is getting real, folks.
So I leave you with this thought: what are you talking about with your clients? Do they know cyber attacks are real-deal dangerous? Are they taking action based on this knowledge?
That's all for now!
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