Many hospitality companies are struggling with the question of how much to spend on cybersecurity especially in the context of revenue losses related to the pandemic. The challenge is that the risk of cyberattacks is rapidly escalating. There are several drivers of this alarming trend. First, ransomware is growing in severity both in the scope and the scale of attacks as well as the amount of the ransom demand. Next is the increase in remote work during the global pandemic and the rush to facilitate at home working. And finally, small companies are increasingly targeted because they are “easy” victims and typically more vulnerable.
As you might expect, the cost of cybercrime increased more than 50% from 2019 through 2020. According to a report by McAfee¹, the global cost is estimated to be more than $1 trillion and monetary losses are estimated at $945 billion. Examples of hidden or intangible costs that are difficult to measure include system downtime, reduced efficiency, brand damage and loss of trust. Expenses that are direct and easier to measure are consultant services, legal fees and cyber risk insurance premiums. Below is a chart published in the McAfee report that illustrates this trend.
The article discusses the relevance of cybersecurity for hotels in light of more and more people working from home after the pandemic. Common risks and their safeguards have been described along with a set of best practices that hotels should adopt to prevent breaches.
