Incident Response Plans: Dealing With Data Breaches And Cyberattacks In South Africa

Organisations of all sizes and across all industry sectors are becoming targets of cyber criminals. Attacks are becoming more frequent, more sophisticated and with dire consequences. A focus on mitigation is vital and requires an incident response plan.

In South Africa, the Cybercrimes and Cybersecurity Bill, introduced to parliament in February 2017, aims to consolidate offences relating to cybercrimes, as well as to create new cybercrimes and offences to bring South Africa in line with relevant international conventions and model laws.

Specifically, the Bill introduces a reporting and preservation of evidence obligation for electronic communications service providers (as defined in the Electronic Communications Act 36 of 2005), as well as financial institutions (as defined in the Financial Services Board Act 97 of 1990).