The number of reported data breaches shrank noticeably in the first quarter of 2018, and the run-up in cryptocurrency prices could have been a factor, according to a new study from vulnerability analysis and intelligence firm Risk Based Security.

The company said 686 data breaches exposing about 1.4 billion records were reported in the first quarter of 2018, compared to more than 1,400 incidents exposing about 3.4 billion records in the first quarter of 2017. A little more than one in 10 (11.5%) of incidents occurred in the finance and insurance sector.

“We knew we were seeing less activity than prior quarters but we were still surprised by the final tally,” Risk Based Security Executive Vice President Inga Goddijn said. “We were geared up for a wave of activity targeting tax filing data that never fully materialized as expected.”

Risk Based Security said more than 200 instances of W-2 data theft were disclosed in the first quarter of 2017, but fewer than 35 instances were disclosed during the first quarter of 2018.

The rise in the value of bitcoin and other cyrptocurrencies may have prompted some criminals to stop stealing data and start stealing computing resources in order to mine currency, the report said.

“While there is no direct data linking the rise of crypo-miners to a reduction in data breach activity, there are tantalizing bits of evidence that lead us to believe there is some level of relationship at play here,” Goddijn noted.

The top five breach types in the first three months of 2018 were hacking, skimming, inadvertent disclosure on the internet, phishing and malware. Most breaches (67%) originated from outside the organization. Most were discovered by people outside the organization as well.

The average number of days between breach discovery and reporting was 37.9 in the first quarter of 2018 compared to 42.7 days in the first quarter of 2017 and 68.9 days in the first quarter of 2016, suggesting that organizations are speeding up their disclosure processes.

Names, email addresses, Social Security numbers, addresses and passwords were the most common types of data exposed during the quarter, according to the report. The percentage of breaches exposing Social Security numbers was 27% for the first quarter of 2018, compared to 28.8% in the same quarter of 2017 and 17.1% in the first quarter of 2016.

Does the drop in data breaches in the first quarter of 2018 mean everyone is getting better at detecting and stopping them? It's likely too early to tell.

“Other than the dip in the number of data breaches reported, Q1 2018 was very much in lock step with recent quarters. If there was a truly seismic shift in breach activity we would expect other metrics to show some signs of change as well. Given this, we think the jury is still out on whether the dip is a one-time blip or part of a larger trend,” Goddijn said.

Instant Insights /

Number of Data Breaches Actually Falls in Q1: Study

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