As the circumstances surrounding WannaCry, Petya/Goldeneye, the Shadow Brokers and exposed voters' records have shown, cybersecurity events continue to cripple companies no matter their size or industry.

An analysis of CNA claims data from 2012–2016 shows that the following are the most common causes of claims:

• Human error — 34%
• Hacking — 25%
• Theft of laptop, tablet or other device — 12%
• Violation of privacy statutes — 10%
• Malware and ransomware — 8%
• Phishing — 6%
• Fraudulent transfer — 4%
• Other — 13%

Any industry can be a target for hackers or be vulnerable to a cyber incident but, certain industries have emerged as particularly vulnerable. According to the Verizon 2017 Data Breach Report, the following were the most likely victims:

• Financial organizations — 24%
• Healthcare organizations — 15%
• Retail & accommodation (combined) c 15%
• Public sector entities — 12%

Although cybersecurity is broad and complex, some best practices can help prevent hackers from successfully infiltrating your customers' operations, as well as your own. The most common cause of claim — human error — can be lowered by educating employees on what to look out for when accessing e-mails or websites. A mature cybersecurity program relies on a layered security approach: — meaning that no single control is the only source of protection for a corporate asset. Three controls that make up a layered security approach are secure password practices, multi-factor authentication and security awareness training.

Secure password practices

For many people, it's difficult to remember unique, complex passwords for every website — a complication that leads to password reuse. Unfortunately, cyber criminals recognize this as a normal occurrence. When your credentials are compromised on one site, hackers will take that username and password and try it other places, with success.