Security News > 2021 > November > Fear and shame are making it harder to fight ransomware and accidental data loss, report finds
A third of employees admit lying to hide the fact that they accidentally deleted data, most doing so out of embarrassment or fear of punishment.
A study of knowledge workers in 10 countries found that workplace cultures of blame and fear are causing businesses to lose critical, sensitive data that could have otherwise been saved if employees were comfortable enough to come forward.
Enterprise data protection company Veritas Technologies published the study, which focused on "The damage that workplace blame cultures are having on the success of cloud adoption," and focuses specifically on worker response to incidents they've had on those platforms.
In 20% of the instances where someone did realize what had happened, the data they had accidentally deleted was irrevocably lost.
The combination of false confidence and a fear of shame has created an environment where workers put losing documents and introducing ransomware higher in their list of most stressful situations than a job interview, public speaking or a first date.
Jelley has another tip: Fears about being the cause of lost data can't exist if the data can't be lost.