The global pandemic, along with the digital transformation it accelerated, broadened corporate attack surfaces exponentially. As a result, there were almost 1,800 publicly reported data breaches in the first six months of 2021 alone, accounting for the exposure of 18.8 billion records. Among these were devastating, large-scale breaches of consumer names, contact details and financial records, such as the ongoing Accellion compromise that has impacted over 100 companies, organizations and government agencies, and the recent T-Mobile breach that exposed the details of 47 million customers.
Tide Foundation, a Sydney-based, five-person startup competing in TechCrunch Disrupt Startup Battlefield this week, claims that its “first-of-its-kind” encryption protocol could make this so-called “cyber breach pandemic” — a tagline the nonprofit was using before the global crisis struck — a thing of the past.