Employee mistakes more of a threat than hackers

New research from IDC and security vendor RSA, that included 400 top level executives, revealed that organisations are more likely to suffer from accidental data security leaks than malicious insider attacks.

Additionally, the accidental data leaks often cause more damage than insider attacks.

Thus, the study proved that most security leaks are truly accidents that occur when employees do not follow correct security protocol or misuse information accidentally, versus malicious insiders who intend to use the information negatively.

The firms that participated in the poll reported that accidental data loss accounted for 6,244 of incidents; unauthorized people receiving privileged access to data resulted in 5.794 incidents of risk, and malware attacks that came from within the firms accounted for 5,830 incidents.

52% of all the respondents in the survey felt the threat incidents were not intentional while only 19% felt that the threats were planned.

The incidents were caused most often by sloppiness, a lack of training, and misunderstandings, which all create the perfect atmospheres for cybercriminals who are looking to hack into a business’s security system.

The RSA report stated that although rogues are always a serious threat, the major problem and security threats that a business must face is good employees that inadvertently do the wrong thing.

IDC employee Christopher Young said that there is a growing need to be competitive among executives and thus internal risks are growing as well.

In order to combat this, executives need to look at the way they currently protect their data and revaluate security measures.

Story link: Employee mistakes more of a threat than hackers