The average cost of a data breach has increased to 12% over the past five years to US$3.92 million, according to a report sponsored by tech giant IBM.

The report released by Censinet and the Ponemon Institute which was funded by IBM, conducted research on more than 500 companies around the world that suffered a breach over the past year.

According to the report, 72 percent of respondents believe that the increasing dependence on third party medical devices to the network is most risky, while 68 percent say connecting medical devices to the internet increases the risk of cyberattack. 

“This research confirms that healthcare providers require a better, more cost-effective approach to third-party risk management,” said Ed Gaudet, CEO, and founder of Censinet. “The adoption of technology in healthcare is more rapid and complicated than ever before. As an industry, we must help providers safely enable cloud applications and medical devices optimized to deliver the quality of care hospitals and their patients expect.”

In India, on an average, 35,636 records were compromised in a data breach, and cost ₹12.8 crore to organizations from July 2018 and April 2019,

“It’s clear that healthcare providers are in a tough spot. The number of vendors they rely on is increasing at the same time the threats those vendors pose are escalating in frequency and severity, so it’s easy to see how managing these risks has become an overwhelming problem,” said Dr. Ponemon, chairman and founder of the Ponemon Institute. “But it’s not all bad news – we can very clearly see an opportunity with automation for healthcare providers to monitor, measure, and mitigate the scourge of third-party breaches that continues to plague their industry.”