Email leaks a threat to business security 2:02pm 5.06.08

One in five businesses has dismissed an employee due to email leaks of company data, shows a Proofpoint survey conducted by Forrester Research. Proofpoint, a data loss prevention business, found that 23 percent of Australian respondents had been negatively affected by leaked data. Almost half had disciplined employees for breaches.

"What's surprising is that it's often hard to get a complete picture of the cost of each instance of data loss," says Gerry Tucker, regional head of Proofpoint. "But the cost of going through an investigation, a disciplinary process and finally termination can be quite significant … someone is not going to do all that unless the breach has been serious."
 
Respondents listed corporate email, web-based email, messaging systems, blogs and message boards as potential sources for leaks. In many cases, these are important business tools and therefore difficult to secure, says Tucker. "To a large extent, companies don't know what data is going out of their environment."