Respondents in US, UK and Germany Report High Levels of Data Breach and Compliance Failures

SAN JOSE, Calif., June 18, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Vormetric, a leader in enterprise data security for physical, virtual, big data, public, private and hybrid cloud environments, today announced the 2015 Vormetric Insider Threat Report – European Edition. Polling for the report was conducted online on Vormetric's behalf by Harris Poll in fall 2014 among 818 enterprise IT decision makers (ITDMs) in various countries, including 204 in the U.K. and Germany as well as 404 in the U.S. Analysis and research into the results was performed by analyst firm Ovum. Respondents in all three countries reported high levels of data breach and compliance failures. 44 percent of U.S. respondents, 40 percent of U.K. respondents and 26 percent of respondents in Germany reported that they had encountered a data breach or failed a compliance audit in the last year.

ClickToTweet: US nearly 2X higher rate than Germany of data breach & compliance failures. Why? http://bit.ly/1S5Z1se http://bit.ly/1IACE9Q

"These responses are disturbing because they represent strong evidence that organizations are systematically failing to secure their data," said Tina Stewart, vice president of global market strategy for Vormetric. "Part of the problem is a pervasive perception that meeting compliance standards is all that needs to be done to protect sensitive information. With this perception, and with attacks changing by the hour, slowly evolving compliance mandates result in organizations fighting today's battles with yesterday's weapons, and failing to protect sensitive data not covered by compliance requirements."

Ordinary employees, privileged users and the supply chain – such as contractors and third party service providers – are all conduits for a traditional insider threat. But the spectrum of insider threats also includes the compromise of these insider accounts by hackers using Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) attacks and other methods. As cloud and big data adoption accelerates, these new technologies also bring new risks to organizations with additional administrative roles and potentials for infrastructure compromise.

The report reveals key insights into how both European and U.S. organizations prioritize cloud security, data accessibility, privacy violations and compliance requirements as well as strong differences in approach and attitude to the problem.

Notable contrasts between European and U.S. organizations include:

• Spending to offset the threat: 62 percent of U.S. respondents plan to increase spend on additional security measures compared to only 44 percent in Germany and 51 percent in the U.K.
• IT Security Spending Priorities: The top European IT security spending priority identified by respondents was protection of intellectual property (49 percent U.K. and 55 percent in Germany), while in the U.S. preventing a data breach ranked the highest priority (54 percent)
• Top reasons for protecting data: Compliance topped the list of reasons for protecting data in the U.K. (53 percent) and Germany (59 percent) while in the U.S. it was in third place (43 percent)

"The report clearly shows growing awareness of changes in threats to organizations' data, but it also outlines that organizations have not yet adjusted their security posture to offset these changes," added Stewart. "Rapid growth in the volume of sensitive information, new technology environments such as cloud and big data as well as swiftly changing attack methods make traditional end point and network perimeter security increasingly ineffective. Organizations everywhere must take a data-centric approach, using encryption with access controls to limit data exposure, and monitoring data access to identify inappropriate user activity."

Source/Methodology – 2015 Vormetric Insider Threat Report
Vormetric's 2015 Insider Threat Report was conducted online by Harris Poll on behalf of Vormetric from September 22-October 16, 2014, among 818 adults ages 18 and older, who work full-time as an IT professional in a company and have at least a major influence in decision making for IT. In the U.S., 408 ITDMs were surveyed among companies with at least $200 million in revenue with 102 from the health care industries, 102 from financial industries, 102 from retail industries and 102 from other industries. Roughly 100 ITDMs were interviewed in the U.K. (103), Germany (102), Japan (102), and ASEAN (103) from companies that have at least $100 million in revenue. ASEAN countries were defined as Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, and the Philippines. This online survey is not based on a probability sample and therefore no estimate of theoretical sampling error can be calculated.

About Vormetric
Vormetric (@Vormetric) is the industry leader in data security solutions that protect data-at-rest across physical, big data and cloud environments. Vormetric helps over 1500 customers, including 17 of the Fortune 30, to meet compliance requirements and protect what matters – their sensitive data – from both internal and external threats. The company's scalable Vormetric Data Security Platform protects any file, any database and any application's data —anywhere it resides — with a high performance, market-leading solution set. For more information, please visit: www.vormetric.com.

Vormetric is a trademark of Vormetric, Inc

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20130626/SF38541LOGO

SOURCE Vormetric

Related Links

http://www.vormetric.com