The failure of corporate chiefs to make security a priority and a reactive
approach to data protection has left many companies vulnerable to attack,
especially via emerging technologies such as smart phones and cloud computing,
according to a survey of information technologists. published on Tuesday.
The Worldwide State of the Endpoint 2010 study, conducted by the Ponemon
Institute and funded by security firm Lumension, used data from more than 1,400
interviews of information-security practitioners and nearly 1,600 IT-operations
professionals from the U.S., Germany, Australia, New Zealand and the UK. The
report found that 56 percent of respondents said that mobile devices posed a
significant security risk to their organization and 49 percent stated that the
company's CEO did not give strong support to security initiatives.