UK companies lead in email security
Security firm Proofpoint’s fifth annual email security and data loss prevention survey (report available on registering here), carried out in March by Forrester Consulting, found UK companies more rigorous in checking employee e-mail than their counterparts in Germany and France.
Fifty-three percent of the polled UK companies regularly audit outbound e-mail content, while 47 percent investigated a leak in the last year. Forty-four percent reported firing employees for violation of e-mail security policies, and 78 percent had disciplined workers for the same offence.
The report highlights the proliferation of means whereby employees could break financial disclosure or corporate governance rules, leak intellectual property or trade secrets, and divulge sensitive memos or breach privacy regulations.
"The convenience and ubiquity of email as a business communications tool has exposed enterprises to a wide variety of legal, financial and regulatory risks associated with outbound e-mail,” said the report. “Webmail, FTP, blogs, message boards, media sharing sites and social networking sites are a source of concern as well as real-world risk for IT professionals working in large enterprises.”
