Check Point: Three in four UK firms suffer data loss

Vendor blames employee awareness as its research finds majority of UK firms experienced data loss in the past year

Three quarters of UK organisations have suffered data loss in the past year, with lack of employee awareness fingered as a major contributing factor.

That is according to a Check Point-backed study which quizzed 450 IT administrators in the UK and more than 2,400 worldwide.

The research, carried out by the Ponemon Institute earlier this year, found that 75 per cent of UK organisations experienced data loss in the past year, compared with an average of 77 per cent internationally.

The blame was laid partly at the door of poor employee awareness, with more than half (53 per cent) of the UK respondents believing staff have little or no awareness of data security, compliance and policies.

Oded Gonda, vice president of network security products at Check Point, said: "In order to move data loss from detection to prevention, businesses should consider integrating more user awareness and establish the appropriate processes to gain more visibility and control of information assets."

For the UK, customer information was the most commonly compromised type of data (52 per cent of respondents), followed by intellectual property (36 per cent), employee information (36 per cent) and consumer information (35 per cent).

Lost or stolen equipment was cited as the source of the data loss by 35 per cent of UK respondents. Network attacks (25 per cent), Web 2.0 and file-sharing applications (22 per cent) and unencrypted USB or media storage devices (19 per cent), were also commonly cited.