Employees remain one of the biggest threats to an enterprise’s cybersecurity program, a new survey by Nuix has found.
Its paper, titled Defending Data: Turning Cybersecurity Inside Out With Corporate Leadership Perspectives on Reshaping Our Information Protection Practices, reported that 93% of respondents consider their own staff to be the most prominent cyber hazard.
This sentiment, the poll established, was irrespective of a company’s security efforts by way of technology and guidelines – insider threats continue to be a persistent nuisance.
When asked what the best strategy was in dealing with this problem, fear was cited by 39% of respondents as being one of the most effective forms of risk mitigation.
Accordingly, over the last 12 months, there has been a noticeable shift in focus for corporate information security practitioners, Nuix observed.
Dealing with insider threats has grown in prominence, with 71% of cyber experts stating that they now have a specific set of policies based on this vulnerability.
“The findings in this report are of no surprise – they represent the same issues and concerns that we’re advising our customers on every day,” commented Keith Lowry, senior vice president of business threat intelligence and analysis at Nuix.
“First, there’s greater awareness of insider threats thanks to the public profiles of Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden. It’s also easier to steal information; for example, you can copy key files onto a thumb drive in seconds.”
Other key findings from the poll include the rise in popularity of bring your own device (BYOD) schemes, whereby employees are encouraged to utilize their own devices in the workplace.
Nuix noted that 84% of respondents work for a firm that now has a BYOD policy, up from 69% in 2014.
This approach, while practical and beneficial to an enterprise, does however present certain security risks.
