Two-thirds of firms ‘neglecting’ wireless security

Resellers have been urged to push wireless LAN security as damning new research indicates it is a big hole in many European firms’ defences.

After quizzing 400 IT executives at large enterprises in the UK, France, The Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Spain and the Nordics, research house Vanson Bourne concluded that nearly two-thirds (64 per cent) are neglecting wireless LAN security.

The research, which was sponsored by Motorola Enterprise Mobility Solutions, also found that only 30 per cent used any form of wireless intrusion prevention system.

Amit Sinha, chief technologist of Motorola Enterprise Wireless LAN, scolded firms' lack of awareness. “Companies would be naive to use the same security mechanisms for wired as well as wireless LANs.

“It is surprising that companies today are not using wireless encryption standards like WPA2. The cost of a data breach is $200–$300 per compromised record, an order of magnitude more than the cumulative cost of security technologies to prevent exposure. Prevention is always better than cure.”

Another key finding of the research was that many IT teams were found to be wasting their time on security activities which could easily be automated. Over half (58 per cent) of respondents said they spent more than two hours each week searching for ‘rogue’ access points, for instance.

“Manually validating wireless policy compliance is costly, error-prone and leaves gaps in security,” said Sinha. "Companies need to invest in robust WLAN infrastructure with 24x7 monitoring for gap-free security and cost-effective regulatory compliance.”