Dive Brief:
- California Attorney General Kamala Harris' latest data breach report said there were 178 data breaches in California last year, endangering 24 million records.
- Although the number of breaches didn't increase, the number of records involved shot up from 4.3 million in 2014 to more than 24 million in 2015.
- Most of the stolen data were attributed to large breaches, such as the Anthem breach that affected more than 10 million California residents and the UCLA Health breach that affected 4.5 million.
Dive Insight:
The report found between 2012 and 2015 there were 657 data breaches that compromised 49 million records of resident's personal data. Social security numbers, payment card data and medical information were the top three types of data stolen over the past four years. Healthcare accounted for 16% of breaches, behind retail (24%) and finance (18%).
"Government and the private sector have a shared responsibility to safeguard consumers from threats to their privacy, finances and personal security," Harris said in a press release. "California is leading the nation with measures to prevent data breaches, but we can do better," she added.