@Risk

Can you think of ways to improve risk management at your company?

According to new research by Ernst & Young, the vast majority of C-suite execs would answer that question with a resounding “Yes.”

In fact, 96% of participants in Ernst & Young’s new survey said that their risk management programs could be improved. Nearly half (46%) believe that committing more resources to risk management would help create a competitive advantage. And, only 1% said that they intend to reduce risk management resources next year.
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In what has been heralded as “one of the most comprehensive risk management research studies in the European retail and consumer brands sector since the financial crisis began,” Marsh, the world’s leading insurance broker and risk advisor, found that the recession has significantly increased risk awareness across the industry.

Specifically, senior executives at Europe’s leading retail and consumer brands businesses say that over the next 18 months, they will be concerned with risks associated with cash flow, their supply chains, and trade credit.

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Nine out of 10 investment and operations executives in a recent survey rate risk as an “important” or “primary” consideration in their decision-making. Interestingly, though, about the same percentage feel they need additional skills and experience to effectively model, interpret and utilize the results from sophisticated risk models.

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Yesterday, Accenture released its 2009 Global Risk Management Study, and the results, to be frank, are sobering. The economic crisis has hit hard, and the vast majority of companies in the survey (85%) say they need to overhaul their approach to risk management. In the past, there has been little effort to align risk management with core business strategies, or to integrate risk management with operations and performance. Now, though, it appears that organizations are waking up to the benefits of investing in enhanced, integrated risk management capabilities.

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Yesterday I posted about how the tumult in today’s business environment (layoffs, corporate restructuring programs, etc.) can increase the potential for fraud and theft from employees. But, of course, you need to be aware of information threats from other sources, as well. Sometimes a data breach stems from something relatively straightforward, such as a lost or stolen laptop. In other cases, digital forensics are necessary to track down thornier root causes, such as hacks and malware.

The world-renowned Verizon Business RISK Team has investigated more than 600 data breaches over the past five years, and the team recently published its 2009 Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR) , which provides statistics and analysis regarding the 90 confirmed breaches in the team’s 2008 caseload. These 90 breaches represent an astounding 285 million compromised records –if that’s not a wake-up call to cybercrime, I’m not sure what is.

Here’s a small sampling of the statistical analysis of the team’s 2008 caseload:

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