David Koretz, CEO of Adventive, wrote an article earlier this month addressing how security should not be an after-thought for marketers. He brought up the Sony Playstation data leak  that had almost 100 Million users have their private data, including credit card info, stolen. David's main point is that this was totally preventable.

In our business dealings we have seen first hand how major companies treat security. Their viewpoint is that it's not a problem until there is a problem. However, by that time it's too late. The damage has been done. Let's say a jewellery store decides not to put in an alarm system and then gets robbed. The next day they go and get one installed. But it's too late, the store has already been robbed. Unfortunately internet businesses act the same way. They fail to understand that to certain people, user data is just as valuable as jewellery.

Now why does this concern marketers? Because it ultimately falls on them to help fix it with users. Just look at Sony; the tech team worked to resolve it, but marketing had to do damage control and then give-aways to appease users. In both the short-term and long-term, this is going to cost Sony a lot more than it would have to implement a proper security solution. The CEO and Sales team, are also part of marketing so they too should make security a top priority; at the end they have to explain to new customers and shareholders why this was not prevented.

With security you need to be proactive because being reactive could make you lose all your customers. And to quote David Korentz, "If you are willing to lose your customers' data, you should also be willing to lose all your customers."