@Risk

Last month, federal officials cracked down on West Coast shop owners who allegedly sell counterfeit merchandise.

In one of the largest federal enforcement actions ever taken against West Coast retailers suspected of selling counterfeit designer apparel and accessories, the authorities seized approximately $100 million worth of counterfeit merchandise and charged the owners, operators and employees of eight shops in San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf district with a 25-count indictment.

According to a press release, the designer fakes, which were illegally imported from China, included clothing, handbags and wallets, jewelry and watches, scarves, sunglasses and shoes –all bearing the labels of more than 70 well-known designer brands. Among the brands were a number of US-based companies like Oakley, Dooney and Bourke, Nike, Coach and Kate Spade, and foreign designers such as Armani, Burberry, Prada and Louis Vuitton. Affidavits filed in connection with the case describe multiple instances where clerks at the targeted stores acknowledged to ICE undercover agents posing as customers that the merchandise they were buying was counterfeit. (more…)

Here’s a remarkable statistic: Among the more than 900 electronic records breaches that Verizon Business experts investigated last year, a whopping 96 percent could have been avoided if security basics had been followed.

That’s right. Nearly all of these breaches could have been avoided; only 4 percent of the breaches analyzed required difficult and expensive protective measures. In addition, most victimized organizations (87 percent) had evidence of a breach in their security logs, but overlooked these red flags due to a lack of staff, tools or processes.

The new 2010 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report , which for the first time was prepared in collaboration with the US Secret Service, is filled with other fascinating results, too –all of which offer some important perspective about the vulnerability of business data and the most effective approaches for mitigating cybercrime threats.  For instance, the report also reveals that: (more…)

Mexico continues to be a positive business proposition for many companies. However there’s no doubt that it is becoming increasingly more challenging –and more costly –to mitigate risks to operations, supply chains and personnel there.

Consider this: Since 2006, more than 24,000 people have been killed in drug violence in Mexico, and as an article in The Dallas Morning News puts it: (more…)

The food supplies of Afghanistan and nine African states are those most at risk and vulnerable to rising costs, based on results of the Food Security Risk Index 2010, released last week by Maplecroft.

The Index uses 12 criteria developed in collaboration with the World Food Programme to evaluate risks to the supply of basic food staples for 163 countries. These criteria include: the nutritional and health status of populations, cereal production and imports, GDP per capita, natural disasters, conflict, and the effectiveness of government.

Following these calculations, Maplecroft rated Afghanistan as least secure in food supplies, while also ranking the African nations of the Democratic Republic of Congo (2), Burundi (3), Eritrea (4), Sudan (5), Ethiopia (6), Angola (7), Liberia (8), Chad (9) and Zimbabwe (10) as “extreme risk.” In all, African nations make up 36 of the 50 nations most at risk in the index. (more…)

Most large US employers are moving forward with plans to make changes to their 2011 health care benefit programs in the wake of both health reform and expected large health benefit cost increases next year, according to a new survey by the National Business Group on Health.

The survey–which collected responses from 72 of the nation’s largest corporations representing more than 3.7 million employees –was conducted in May and June, 2010. The results show that: (more…)