Julia has analysed the key statistics released by the OAIC has released some key statistics on the eligible data breach reports it has received in the six weeks since the notifiable data breach scheme commenced on 22 February 2018.

1. Notifiable Data Breach Scheme Statistics
The OAIC has released some key statistics on the eligible data breach reports it has received in the six weeks since
the notifiable data breach scheme commenced on 22 February 2018.
Data breach report by industry
24%
Health
service
providers
16%
Legal,
accounting
&
Management
services
10%
Education
6%
Charities
31%
Other
varied
industries
Personal information affected
78%
Contact
information
30%
Financial
details
33%
Health
information
24%
Identity
Information
*incl. superannuation
13%
Finance
*such as bank account or
credit card numbers
2%
Other
sensitive
information
14%
TFN
*such as drivers licence
and passport numbers
Cause of the data breach
shown as a % of the total number of data breach reports submitted
(such as sending an email to the incorrect recipient email address)
Malicious or
criminal attack
System fault
Other
Human error
2%
4%
44%
50%
These statistics show that the largest number of data breaches have occurred, surprisingly (or maybe
unsurprisingly), as a result of human error rather than from malicious third party attacks. This is a timely reminder to
all businesses with notifiable data breach obligations to ensure that you have appropriate procedures in place to
identify all types of data breaches (not just malicious third party attacks) and have given staff sufficient training to be
able to identify when a data breach occurs.
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shown as a % of the total number of data breach reports submitted
occurence shown as a % of the total number of data breach reports submitted