Data Breaches Reach Record High in Washington

Attorney General Bob Ferguson (D) Tuesday. Businesses reported 112 of the year’s 279 breaches in the state, with communications firms sending the most notices to consumers: 3.4 million. A mega breach of Comcast was responsible for 3.1 million of them. This is the first time that the number of individual notices of breaches has exceeded the state’s population and is the highest number of citizen breaches affected. “The more people know about data breaches, the more they can protect themselves,” Ferguson said in a news release. Retail had the most data breach incidents, at 20, sending 88,000 consumers notices. A cyberattack was the most common way data breaches occurred, with 217 instances, said the report. Ten were the result of either theft or a mistake, and 52 happened when an unauthorized person accessed secure data through something like an unsecured network or left sensitive documents out on a desk. Ransom was behind 113 of the cyberattacks; malware, 31; phishing, nine; skimming -- using a malicious card reader on a payment terminal, two. “These statistics further underscore our state’s critical need for comprehensive data privacy regulation,” Ferguson said in the report. “Data breaches are symptomatic of gaps in data privacy policies and the standards and practices of every entity that collects or controls this information.”