Data breach, Linklaters: 66% increase across major European market

GDPR-related data breach notifications across major European markets have surged by two-thirds over the past year, according to a Linklaters study.

The analysis – which covered data from seven European countries, including Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain and the UK – shows almost a double of notifications in France, while in Spain notifications increased by more than half to 1,609. The increase in notifications in France and Spain is because companies are now more aware of their obligations under GDPR, Linklaters specifies.

The only country to see a decline in notifications was the UK, which dropped by 17% compared to the first year of GDPR to 11,499 notifications, in part because UK organisations over-reported breaches between May 2018 and May 2019, the study underlines

In most cases, key sources of breaches involved confidentiality and access by unauthorised third parties, either through malicious acts such as hacking, sending emails or documents to the wrong recipients, and the theft or loss of unsecured mobile devices and laptops.