What Is Insider Risk?

“Insider risk occurs when any data exposure (regardless of perceived data value or user intent) jeopardizes the well-being of an organization and its employees, customers or partners.”

Insider risk’s focus is on an organization’s data problems rather than its people problems. Insider threat management involves attempting to guess which users pose a threat to an organization’s data and taking action to manage these threats. However, this approach is often ineffective because most data breaches occur due to negligence, which means focusing on the “obvious threats” will cause them to be overlooked entirely.

In contrast, insider risk management focuses on the data that is at risk of compromise. By monitoring for activities that place this data at risk, Insider Risk Management prepares an organization to respond to any potential data breach, regardless of the intent behind it.

Why are Insider Risks So Dangerous?

Insider risks are dangerous because every insider risk is a potential data breach waiting to happen. Insider risks occur when data that is valuable and potentially injurious to an organization is exposed. This can occur with or without malicious intent on behalf of the insider who caused the exposure.

Employees and other insiders require access to sensitive data in order to do their jobs; however, there is a fine line between “safe” and legitimate use of data and insider risks. Effectively managing the danger of insider risks requires the ability to differentiate between normal operations and insider risks. This enables the company to manage these risks while minimizing the impact on legitimate activity and employee productivity.

Insider Risks Cause Challenges for Data Exposure, Leak, and Theft

Our Annual Data Exposure reports survey 700 business leaders, security leaders and practitioners from companies in the U.S. Learn more about the factors leading to increased insider risk. Read 2022 Data Exposure Report.

60% of data breaches involve in insider.

96% of companies experience challenges in protecting corporate data from insider risks.

10% of company budgets are dedicated to dealing with insider risks.

How Do You Identify Insider Risks?

A key part of insider risk management is accurately differentiating between legitimate and safe use of data and actions that place the company at risk. To help differentiate between these two cases, we recommend using the File-Vector-User approach by asking the following questions: