Execs oblivious to data security problems

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Nearly half of UK executives don't know how many security incidents their business has had to cope with in the last year, according to research.

PricewaterhouseCoopers' Global State of Information Security Survey, which questioned more than 7,000 business leaders, showed that 49 per cent of UK execs were unaware of incidents.

This compared to seven per cent in China, which the report called the leader in information security.

Only 37 per cent of businesses had an accurate inventory of where their data was stored, while the same low percentage employed a chief information security officer.

However, there was good news when it came to spending, as 63 per cent of respondents believed that spending would stay the same or increase in the next year, compared to 12 per cent who thought it would be cut.

Jon Hayton, a director in PricewaterhouseCoopers' forensic investigations team, said that the findings from the survey matched what it was seeing from companies it worked with in Britain.

“It is good news that companies have chosen not to slash security budgets," he said. "Good security practice needs to be embedded into the DNA of a business, not bolted on as an afterthought."

“Unfortunately there are many organisations where this is still the case. That makes their security performance very fragile," he added. “When it goes, it can go very quickly. I have seen good security practices fall apart in months.”

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