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Information Risk Management (IRM)

What is Information Risk Management (IRM)

Information Risk Management (IRM) is the effort to combat threats, vulnerabilities, and consequences of unprotected data. There are many threats to unsecure files, the vulnerabilities are genuine, and the consequences for a business can be dire.[1]

Elements of Information Risk

Information Risk Management involves thoroughly assessing your clients' stored data. What kind of risks is threatening it? What is making it vulnerable to those risks? And what would happen if that data was compromised?

  • Threats: Somewhat ironically, humans are the number-one threat to a company’s IT. And not all of those data compromises are conducted by hackers. Over a third of all the data security breaches at government agencies are accidents, the fault of an internal employee acting carelessly. And that’s to say nothing of viruses and other malware, which pose an ongoing threat to all IT forms.
  • Vulnerabilities: The vulnerabilities of a company exist in the loads of sensitive data that is stored, accessed, modified, transferred, and then stored again in different places by different people. This information often includes names, social security numbers, and other personal data. It can also include financial information such as credit card and bank account numbers.
  • Consequences: Identity theft occurs once every two seconds in the United States. Financial data records are lost or stolen at a clip of 32 per second. Either of these consequences can be crippling to a business or individual.




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