Going back only 1 month from December 18, 2013, is all that’s needed to find several examples of data breaches that highlight the need for data security and encryption in place everywhere data is kept and especially when data is on the move. With most large organizations storing critical data in mainframes, mainframe encryption tools are needed to protect data from internal and external threats. Want to know what mainframe encryption is all about or perhaps the best encryption solution? Well you’re in luck because that’s why we’ve put together MainframeEncryption.com!

Here are a few examples of data breaches that have made the headlines during the last quarter of 2013:

Sources: Target Investigating Data Breach

Krebsonsecurity, December 18, 2013

Thieves will find any possible weakness in an organization’s network and exploit it. Target is now the latest victim of large scale data theft; data contained in millions of credit cards used at Target stores starting on Black Friday 2013 was potentially taken.

This data breach involves credit cards used at Target stores nationwide over the busiest shopping weekend of the year. In fact, investigators have found that the breach extended well past the Black Friday weekend and likely through December 15th. It sounds like this will be one of the larger retail breaches to date. Information is very limited at this time and it won’t be known for a while exactly how the credit card information was compromised, but this is a case that highlights data breaches can happen anywhere to any organization when sensitive and valuable data is possessed. Every step along the data custody trail must be protected; finding and utilizing security and encryption tools to do so is paramount.

Hackers reportedly steal 42M customer records from online dating network Cupid Media

By Lucian Constantin – Computerworld, November 20, 2013

This situation, like many others happening every month worldwide, simply wouldn’t have happened if Cupid Media had utilized PGP for their data encryption needs. PGP encrypts data at rest and uses sets of keys to determine who can decrypt the data.

42 million customer records were stolen! Only basic personal information was stolen; no big deal, right? Wrong! Put that data into a skilled thief’s hands and who knows how many fake credit cards get created. Consequently, real people end up fighting for their identity’s back. Those are the same people who’ve signed up for an account with this dating service and trusted them with their personal information. Doubt they’ll trust this company again; losing a customer’s trust is nearly impossible to get back. All of this shows how critical it is to safeguard data, no matter how potentially insignificant an organization thinks the data is. Data in an organization’s hands should be protected at all times and exploiting the powers of PGP encryption is an excellent solution.