As corporations struggle with continual IT security shortcomings, two strategies are consistently identified as the keys to reducing the scope of opportunity for those with malicious intent: the creation of a buck stops here, Harry Trumanesque, corporate IT security czar and a security-savvy workforce. Unfortunately neither is the norm.
A recent security survey by Ernst and Young (E&Y) found there is both a lack of IT security priority in the executive suite and a lack of security awareness amongst users.
From January to June 2004 the number of viruses and worms targeting the Microsoft Corp. Windows operating system rose by 350 per cent from the same period the year before, with a total of 4,496 new pieces of malware created to exploit it, according to a recent report released by Symantec Corp.