The beauty of data theft is that we do not see a man clothed in black scaling a wall or robbers marching in with guns for a hold up. In fact, we may not realise that the crime has taken place until much later. Some 62% of corporate houses in the UK had admitted last year of having suffered attacks on their computers. Data loss and corporate espionage is one of the greatest reasons why SMEs have an untimely death. Data theft can have other dire consequences for a company, including loss of its clients, negative publicity, and losing goodwill with other companies. Unfortunately, despite the heavy losses sustained by the industries in the UK, many have trained specialist staff on board who at least know what to in such a situation.



What is Stolen in Data Theft?

What do data thieves steal? Let us look at some of the favourites below.

?Credit card details from financial transactions made over the net is the most often-stolen data. These can be obtained from financial houses such as banks, broking agents, share traders, travel and holiday booking sites and online shopping sites.

?Personal information is easily available from social networking sites. Various people who have a good professional network have had their profiles hacked into, and the contact details of people they knew were stolen. This can be particularly bad if it is the profile of a well known person, whose peers and friends would also be celebrities or important figures.

?Intellectual property (IP) theft is the most common problem faced by corporate houses. Important documents such as customer database, research files, and product details may be stolen from the company to be sold to a rival or used by someone to start his own venture. We will deal with this in detail later.

?Government statistics and security information, if stolen by terrorists, can pose a severe threat to an entire nation.

?Real time robbers and pirates are going techno savvy too. Business transaction details are being ?eavesdropped? on the net to track goods and monetary details, and then plan a theft. This may sound like a racy Hollywood thriller, but fact is always stranger than fiction.

Who Steals?

Who are the people involved in data thefts? Let us try drawing up a list:

?Hackers ? Professional hackers are hired for millions of pounds for stealing IP worth even more. Hackers are no more harmless and cranky geeks, but dangerous criminals with no scruples and immense greed.

?Rivals ? Company rivalry is one of the main reasons behind data theft. One company may employ a hacker or have its own accomplished employees to obtain such industrial information. The constant battles between SAP and Oracle are a case in point.

?Disgruntled Employees ? Employees who are unhappy with a company or any of its staff, or feel that they have not been given their just dues may steal their own data to sell it to another company. It is done either in the hope of a better job or out of pure revenge motive.

?Private Detectives ? Sad but true, there are some individuals as well as firms that run espionage outfits for doubtful causes and a lot of profit. This includes stealing personal data for blackmail or creating evidence for a case.

?Terrorists ? Many terrorist groups have their ?technical corps? to steal and hack into security networks of nations.

?Spammers ? All companies want to make more profit. Spammers use the surfing details and personal information of hundreds of people everyday to help a company market its products better. This too is a breach of privacy but almost impossible to pinpoint.

Why is it Easier to Steal Now?

Stealing data has become much more easy now, than ever before. This is due to the proliferation of portable digital storage devices such as the USB drives, and portable hard disks, wide access to the internet, and the increasingly sophisticated hacking methods evolved due to the internet usage habits of home and office users. One common method is to lure an employee with an interesting mail (?you have won the lottery!?), and then hack into his company's server.

What to Do

If your company has experienced any kind of security breach, you should immediately inform the law, and use the services of professional data forensics experts to crack the crime.