North Carolina issued a Security Breach Report for 2017. From the Executive Summary:
This report provides a summary and discussion of the 1,022 data breaches reported to the North Carolina Department of Justice (NCDOJ) between January 1, 2017 and December 31, 2017. Under North Carolina law, businesses and state and local governments are required to report all security breaches to the Attorney General’s Office. Since this requirement became law in 2005, organizations have reported 4,945 security breaches affecting more than 14.2 million North Carolinians.
Highlighted findings:
- Hacking breaches accounted for 50% of all data breaches in North Carolina in 2017.
- Since 2006, reports of hacking have increased by more than 3,500%.
- Phishing scams made up 24% of all breaches in 2017, up from 1.76% in 2015.
- Accidental release and display breaches have steadily declined since 2013; they accounted for only 13% of total breaches in 2017.
- Last year, more than 5.3 million North Carolinians are estimated to have been affected by data breaches.