It has never been easier for start-up businesses to go overseas, but many of them are now failing to keep up with the global cyber-security regulations that have been prevailing recently. While a severe cyber-attack can literally cripple a business, these stringent European regulations can now easily finish the job in minutes!
The European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) starts on 25th of May and it threatens potential fines of around €20 million or up to 4% turnover for breaches per annum. And contrary to what is there in Australia’s recent Notifiable Data Breaches scheme, there are no exceptions for corporations which are smaller.
The issue seems to be growing so rapidly as a large number of tech-driven start-up businesses expand overseas. Technology has made it very easy for businesses to scale in foreign countries and keep from being weighed down by their high-cost infrastructure. Meanwhile, the incentives that are off-shore and are aimed to attract fintechs are adding fuel to this already burning fire.
Around 54% claimed to be looking to expand overseas in the next 1 year as compared to the other 38% the earlier year. According to the EY FinTech Australia Census 2017, the destination that topped the list was the UK, which is estimated to put in place equal legislation to the GDPR after Brexit.
Other parts of the world are also raising the bar; at least 30 US states brought forth, expanded, or acknowledged security breach notification bills in the year 2017. There are only two US states do yet do not require data breach notification.
Cyber-security is now an intrinsic price of doing business – one that weighs much more heavily firms that are smaller, given that they are as exposed as larger ones but have comparatively less revenue for the fight.
Source: AFR