The call we’ve dreaded for years came in.
“We got broken into over the weekend”
Nooooooooo!
“But they didn’t get the computer”
Whew!
As you can see in the photo, the thief started to pull out all the cables and stopped when they couldn’t unplug the security cable.
The benefits of these cables are twofold: it can deter the thief from taking it as in this example, and if the thief manages to cut it (not likely with tools used in ‘smash and grab jobs’) or pull it out, it will physically damage the case, making it easily identifiable as stolen goods and hopefully prevent it from being sold.
The practice only has one computer at the reception area, but is was physically locked to the wall by a security cable. $70 for a cable and anchor saved this practice from a costly data breach notification, mitigation and potential investigation. Had the computer been stolen, for this practice it still would have been the same outcome since the computer was also encrypted.
There are many in the IT community that dispute whether or not security cables actually work, but in this case it was enough of a deterrent to stop the would-be thief. Your practice is not expected to be secure like Ft. Knox, but you are expected to have reasonable safeguards for physical security.
