Report: Social network data theft a leading cybersecurity concern in 2017

Dive Brief:

• Leaks of personal data collected by technology companies and online services will be among the major cybersecurity threats of 2017, according to a new study from Kaspersky Lab, Bloomberg reports.

• About 78% of users have considered quitting social networks over concerns that their data may fall into the wrong hands, Kaspersky said, citing a survey it recently conducted in 12 countries.

• In response, the cybersecurity firm said it will launch a service called FFForget next year to let users keep personal items like photos when deleting accounts from social networks.

Dive Insight:

Kaspersky doesn’t appear to have much faith in social media security, and mergers like the recent one between Microsoft and LinkedIn have sparked new concerns about how personal data is used and secured. As companies go out of business or merge, they tend to take a lot of user data with them, and the rules and protections that once oversaw that data may suddenly change.

If hackers manage to pierce the defenses of a major social network, enterprises that use those services may also find data they thought was safe is compromised.

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