SSAE-18 - Dealership Corridor

Contributing Author:
Maurice Hamilton
Vice President
EFG Companies

According to their the 2019 MidYear QuickView Data Breach Report published by Cyber Risk Analytics, 3,800 publicly disclosed data breaches occurred in the first six months of 2019, exposing up to 4.1 billion records. This represented a 50% increase over the last four years.

Last week, Experian issued their Data Breach Industry Forecast for 2020, reflecting on the state of cyber security. Their primary takeaway – while a data breach is probably inevitable, companies must prioritize prevention as well as response.

Regardless of the industry, as companies increase their reliance on technology to house personal, confidential information, data breach attempts are expected to increase as well.

For the last 10 to 15 years, dealers have steadily increased the role technology plays in the dealership. Now, they not only use technology to preserve digital records of every piece of paperwork generated in the dealership, but dealers also rely on sophisticated platforms to submit and receive loan applications, rate products, process claims, and more.

EFG Companies, the innovator behind the award-winning Hyundai Assurance program, recently achieved a new level in data security for both clients and contract holders with the Service Organization Control 2 (SOC 2) Certification under the Statement of Standards for Attestation Engagements 18 (SSAE 18) guidelines from the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA).

According to recent risk-based security research, 3,800 publicly disclosed data breaches occurred in the first six months of 2019, exposing up to 4.1 billion records. This represented a 50% increase over the last four years. As companies increase their reliance on technology to house personal, confidential information, data breach attempts are expected to increase as well.

Several years ago, EFG took proactive steps to secure its own data and achieved SSAE 16 certification in 2016. Since then, EFG continued its efforts to further augment the company’s security measures, investing close to a quarter of a million dollars annually on security enhancements, and achieving SSAE 18 certification in December, 2019.

SSAE 18 certification is the most widely recognized standard providing companies with a method for reporting information about the design and operation of internal systems and controls relating to privacy and security regulations. SOC 2 reports evaluate an organization’s information systems relevant to security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality and privacy.