Traverse City (ip-192.com): 80 percent of enterprise security administrators believe that web 2.0 applications pose a significant security risk, according to a survey by the Ponemon Institute. The institute sampled 2,100 IT security administrators in the U.S., United Kingdom, Australia, France, and Japan. 20 percent of the respondents believe that employees rarely or never consider potential risks while downloading applications from the Internet or streaming video, for example.
"Our research finds security can be seen as an afterthought for corporate users of Web 2.0 applications; the growing number and sophistication of security threats, coupled with the proliferation of online and easily downloadable tools, is exacerbating the challenges of protecting sensitive information," said Larry Ponemon, chairman and founder of the Ponemon Institute.
Most applications commonly referred to as Web 2.0 facilitate interoperability, information sharing, and collaboration. The main risks associated with applications such as social networking, instant messaging, widgets, wikis and other Web 2.0 activities are poor workplace productivity, malware, data loss, and viruses, the survey finds. Security policies commonly broken include Internet browsing, downloading and uploading of content, or engaging in social networking at work.
58 percent of the IT professionals surveyed in Australia and the UK said that Web 2.0 applications have a very significant or significant impact on the security of their companies, 43 percent said minimizing security risks associated with Web 2.0 has a high or very high priority in their organization.
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