LODGING LEADERS
236 | Breach of Trust: Cybercrime a pervasive threat to the hospitality industry
LODGING LEADERS
It’s a given in today’s technological age that you operate a hotel business that depends on technology to process customer credit card purchases and to store personal information about your guests that helps you serve them better.
In addition, you probably are aware of cybercrime and that nefarious hackers frequently target payment systems. You’ve done all you can to make sure your customers’ data is secure, even adhering to payment card industry data security standards or PCI DSS and other processing protocols such as the European Union’s general data protection regulation or GDPR.
While it’s a smart move to be PCI and GDPR compliant, that does not fully guarantee your hotel data is safe from hackers.
There is more you can do.
If you think the threat is just too big to handle, know this: A data breach at your business is probable and it will cost you a lot of money.
A new IBM report notes the average cost of a data breach in a U.S. business is more than $8 million. Most of the cost is the result of lost business, meaning travelers stop coming to your hotel because they don’t trust the security of the technology.
The bigger the loss of data and the longer the breach goes undetected, the more it will cost you.
In this episode, Lodging Leaders explores the topic of cyber security and what steps you can take to protect your business information.
Co-host Judy Maxwell attended the HFTP’s 2019 Annual Convention in Orlando, Florida, last month. She covered presentations on cyber security and interviewed the presenters.
Included in this report are Ron Hardin, director of information technology at Sandestin Golf and Beach Resort; Paul West, a risk management and technical adviser at GapSpot!; Jen Stone, senior security analyst with SecurityMetrics; and Scott Boren of Boren & Associates, a compliance auditor.
Resources and Links
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300 | 2020 Hindsight: Lodging Leaders reviews hot topics, gives sneak peek of what’s ahead
Long Live Lodging, an online multimedia news organization that covers the hospitality industry, found itself tossing aside its plans for news coverage late in the first quarter of 2020, when the coronavirus pandemic hit the U.S. and devastated the hospitality industry. The year turned out to be ground-breaking for Long Live Lodging, which developed the industry’s first live digital conference, and its podcast, Lodging Leaders, which increased its followers through timely, credible and balanced reporting on trends and issues driving the industry during the historic year. The company also won international recognition for its coverage of the COVID-19 crisis and its work as a whole. Long Live Lodging is a startup media company, formed in 2019, with Lodging Leaders, which was founded in 2015. In today’s report, we celebrate the podcast’s 300th episode. Podcast founder and co-host Jon Albano and co-host Judy Maxwell have a free-wheeling conversation in which they review the top podcasts of 2020 (Can anyone say ‘fair franchising’?) and give a brief preview of what the media organization plans for 2021.