Major retail data breaches continue; do consumers care?

News of major retail data breaches are becoming commonplace – Home Depot being the latest in a long line – but consumers don’t appear to be changing their behaviors in response.

A report by the Ponemon Institute on behalf of RSA was released Tuesday showing half of the 1,000 consumers surveyed had been the victim of a breach, but only 14 percent say a data breach would affect their shopping or banking behavior.

The study suggests consumers have become desensitized to fraud and identity theft because it has become so prevalent. Other key findings from the Consumer Perceptions on Security report, which was conducted in September and October:

• 77% of consumers say it is very important or important that a service provider promptly notify them if their personal data is lost or stolen.
• 45% say recent breaches have not affected their use of credit or debit cards.
• 77% say they do not trust the security of mobile apps. The report notes the lack of concern demonstrated by the more than 70 billion apps downloaded last year and that only about one-third of consumers admit to reading the permissions requested by apps they download.
• 62% say they do not trust websites that only use passwords to identify users, but about one-third use only one or two passwords across all the online accounts they access.

While consumer actions are not changing in relation to data breach threats, the report concludes by saying they are still placing value in their personal information and have “high expectations among service providers to secure their digital identities.”

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