Data Breach Costs $202 per Customer Record

PGP Corporation and Ponemon Institute issued their fourth annual U.S. Cost of a Data Breach Study. The study examined 43 organizations across 17 different industry sectors with a range of 4,200 to 113,000 records that were affected. According to the report,  data breach incidents cost U.S. companies $202 per compromised customer record in 2008, compared to $197 in 2007. Within that number, the largest cost increase in 2008 concerns lost business created by abnormal churn of customers. Since the study’s inception in 2005, this cost component has grown by more than $64 on a per victim basis, nearly a 40% increase.