IBM's Data Breach Cost Calculator

IBM has a very simple online calculator that the you can use to calculate the cost of a data breach. The two first factors are for the country and business sector in which the breach occurs.

The cost of a breach in Canada is much lower relative to other countries, and Italy and South Africa are areas where a breach is likely to be particularly costly.

In the United States data breaches will be most expensive for the financial world, big tech, and the healthcare industry. Breaches are comparatively inexpensive for companies focusing on research and organizations in the public sector.

IBM will also allow you to input a number of cyber security measures that will mitigate the cost of a breach:

1. AI platform

2. BCM (business continuity management) involvement

3. Board level involvement

4. Chief Information Security Officer appointed

5. Certified Protection Officer appointed

6. Consultants engaged

7. Data classification schema

8. Employee training

9. Data loss prevention

10. Data encryption

11. Incident response team

12. Insurance protection

13. Participation in threat sharing

14. ID protection

15. Security analysts

. . . and vulnerabilities that will make a breach more consequential

1. Compliance failures

2. Extensive cloud migration

3. Internet of Things devices

4. Mobile devices

5. Lost or stolen devices

6. Rush to notify

You can also use the calculator to determine how long it takes to discover and contain a data breach in different countries.

Germany does a lot better than the US and most other big countries.