Week 3 – Entry 3

Q: “Visit PrivacyRights.org to see the types of publicly available information about data breaches. How might researchers use this information to study breaches and forecast future data breach trends ? Enter a paragraph in your journal.”

A: In May 2025, 75 data breaches affected almost one million people, with major incidents at LexisNexis and Harbin Clinic making up more than half of the total impact. These breaches highlight serious vulnerabilities in sectors like data brokering and healthcare, where exposed personal information can have long-lasting consequences. Researchers can use this data to spot patterns, predict where future breaches might happen, and evaluate how effective current security measures are. By analyzing the causes and impacts of these breaches, they can suggest better security practices and push for stronger regulations, especially for data brokers, whose breaches often involve sensitive data that consumers didn’t even know was at risk. 9/18/2025