Data Breaches | News

ID Experts Develop Methodology for Data Breach Response

• By Dian Schaffhauser
• 09/19/12

A company that specializes in helping organizations deal with the fallout from a data breach has developed a methodology for dealing with a security incident. ID Experts' YourResponse provides processes and tools for analyzing and responding to a data breach incident that will result in, as the firm said in a statement, "the most positive outcomes."

The methodology guides the affected organization through four phases in order to determine whether notification is required:

• Discovery, encompassing digital forensics; root cause discovery, and chain of evidence preservation;
• Analysis, to perform incident assessment; risk score, and regulatory obligations;
• Formulation of response, to assess demographics and the special needs of affected individuals in developing a response program to address needs and risks; and
• Response, a program that maps out notification to individuals, regulatory authorities, and the media, develops advisories for incoming phone and web inquiries, identifies identity protection services, and manages identity recovery for victims.

"Too often companies try to handle data breaches themselves, which is just like a patient performing their own appendectomy," said Bob Gregg, CEO of ID Experts. "We created the YourResponse method in order to make data breach response more science than art. By using it, we have the highest customer satisfaction of any data breach solutions vendor."