In May 2020, Celero hosted a Celero Protex™ Managed SIEM Services Webinar to discuss why Canadian credit unions should focus on security, to define Celero’s Managed SIEM offering and to outline Celero’s security roadmap. The webinar which featured Theo Van Wyk, Head of Solution Development & Cyber Security, CDW Canada, who spoke about the results of CDW’s 2020 Security Study: Cyber Resilience. During the webinar, Theo provided insight into cyber security trends and findings from the past year. As part of Cyber Security Awareness Month, we are going to look back on that webinar and the cyber security insights that Theo spoke about.
On behalf of CDW, International Data Corporation (IDC) Canada conducted CDW’s sixth annual security study over the course of October-November 2019. Stakeholders from 2000 organizations were surveyed with strict criteria to provide insight into these Canadian organizations and to further understandings of industry trends. According to Theo, the study has become highly anticipated, with many clients asking for a process version of the data.
With 524 respondents, the organizations surveyed were comprised of small businesses (15-249 employees) with 20.99% participation, medium/large businesses (250-4999 employees) with 50% participation and enterprise businesses (5000+ employees) with 29.01% participation. To ensure the data was representative of Canada, respondent businesses were headquartered all across the country with 20.04% from Western and Central Canada (BC, AB, SK, MB), 38.55% from Ontario, 24.05% from Quebec, 14.05% from Atlantic Canada (NB, NS, NFLD, PEI) and 2.86% not headquartered in Canada but with significant business in Canada.
The theme of this study was to dive in and uncover the difference between cyber security versus resilience. Cyber security is more common in this space but can create limitations and often consists of preventative measures. Resilience encompasses the concept that you cannot recover and continue with business. Additionally, the incident types mentioned in the study include denial of service, infiltration and exfiltration. Denial of service does not have to be a breach but does cause an impact. Infiltration includes a breach of your security defenses that can make it into the network but does not impact PII or sensitive corporate data (E.g. ransomware). Exfiltration is a breach that will impact data and you will have to disclose what data has been lost to governing bodies.
All 524 respondents in the survey indicated that they were attacked in the last 12 months. Additionally, attack success rates continue to rise. The statistics below aren’t meant to be frightening but rather to indicate the severity and necessity of a robust security posture as cyber threats impact every business no matter their size.
Events |
Instances Nation Wide |
Attacks (known) |
119,000,000 |
Exfiltration |
3,700,000 |
Infiltration |
1,900,000 |
Denial of Service |
1,700,000 |
Similarly, the survey results show the prevalence and threat to an organization if they do not have a cyber security plan in place. The costs mentioned below are linked to days of downtime caused by incidents. The average cost can be very daunting but the cost per employee is around $2000 so it is all relative to the size of the organization.
Incidents |
Downtime Associated with Incident Over a Year |
Average Cost Associated with Incident |
Change in Average Cost YoY |
Exfiltration |
17.1 days |
$5,700,000/organization |
+15.8% |
Infiltration |
18.3 days |
$6,700,000/organization |
+31.3% |
Denial of Service |
24.0 days |
$8,400,000/organization |
+19.1% |
Contact us to learn more about the Celero Protex Managed SIEM or to sign up.
Make sure to follow Celero on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram during Cyber Security Awareness Month to see our insight, organizational tips and thought-provoking questions to help keep your credit union as safe as it can be.
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Celero is a leading provider of digital technology and integration solutions to credit unions and financial institutions across Canada. Clients trust Celero’s proven track record delivering innovative banking technologies, digital and payment solutions, cloud computing, outsourcing, IT and advisory services.
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