The cost of IT generally gives even the most hardened business managers sticker shock. So it’s always good news when the cost of something goes down. That’s the case this year with the price tag of data breaches, a costly but often unavoidable mishap. 

A new study from the Ponemon Institute reports that for the first time in seven years that both the organizational cost of such trouble and the cost per lost or stolen record has fallen.

In the institute’s seventh annual “Cost of Data Breach Study: U.S.,” which analyzed data from 49 companies in 14 industries, the average organizational cost of breaches dropped to $5.5 million in 2011. *It had been a whopping  $7.2 million in 2010. The  cost per record fell to $194, down from a previous high of $214.

Of course, there’s a caveat to the good news and it involves actually spending more by the organization. The researchers found that the big factor in the reduction came from companies with a Chief Information Security Officer or those that used the services of a security consultant.

The study authors’ message: It takes money to save money.

Tags: cost, data breach, Ponemon Institute