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Security and Social Media: Half of Companies See Increase in Malware Attacks
Yesterday we saw some startling statistics from the Ponemon Institute on the high frequency of computer fraud in organizations. A parallel report, the Global Survey on Social Media Risks by the Ponemon Institute, looks at another area of security where organizations are now also struggling: Social Media.
While IT organizations are well aware that the use of Social Media in the workplace brings with it the threat of virus and malware, many companies are struggling to create and enforce controls for minimizing those risks. The reality is that Social Media is widely used in most companies — 60 percent of employees use Social Media at their workplace for at least 30 minutes every day for personal reasons. But 52 percent of organizations report a marked increase in the number of malware attacks occurring as a result of their employees using Social Media.
On the one hand, 68 percent of organizations say that they consider the use of Social Media as a serious security threat, but on the other hand, 41 percent have no policies or controls in place to combat Social Media malware, and of those organizations that have Social Media policies in place, only 21 percent say that they are actually enforcing those policies.
Spencer Parker, group product manager at Websense, the sponsor of the Ponemon report, said that “The use of social media in the workplace is growing at a rapid pace. Savvy businesses are using blogs, social networks, wikis and other vehicles to quickly share information with their target audiences. Organisations need to educate employees about how their social media usage could impact the company, develop social media acceptable use policies, set appropriate quotas, and most importantly, invest in the right security technologies that examine the content and context of social media sites in real time.”
With 60 percent of employees using Social Media every day for personal use while on the job, Ponemon questioned employers as to how acceptable that behavior is to them. 90 percent of employees said that networking with friends and colleagues within the organization is totally acceptable Social Media time use. But only 13 percent felt that downloading and watching videos in the workplace was acceptable.
The Ponemon report recommends the following plan of action to better protect organizations from Social Media usage risks:
- Understand that the use of Social Media in the workplace comes with security risks
- Understand the current usage patterns of Social Media among employees and the potential risks
- Create a comprehensive policy for Social Media use in the workplace
- Educate employees about the risks of Social Media and the policy which the organization is adopting
- Adopt technology to better detect and prevent malware and virus attacks from Social Media
