Data Health Check Results
Databarracks' Data Health Check Survey of 500 IT decision makers sheds light on UK data security weaknesses.
Survey snapshot:
- 42% of IT decision makers say staff have company data on BYOD (Bring Your Own Device)
- Only 31% of UK firms include smartphones and tablets as part of backup
- Just 28% of firms have a BYOD policy
- 45% of respondents experienced restore failures over past 12 months
- Human error biggest cause of data loss
A UK study of 500 IT decision makers has revealed that 42% of respondents said employees have company data on personal laptops, smartphones or tablets, with a further 10% admitting they had no idea whether or not workers were using their own devices to hold company information.
The Data Health Check survey run by Databarracks, the UK's largest provider of managed cloud backup and Disaster Recovery, has found less than a third (31%) of companies include smartphones and tablets as part of corporate backup.
Guidelines for BYOD were also found to be lacking, with only 28% of firms having a BYOD policy in place.
The Data Health Check revealed respondents found backing up laptops (30%) and tablets and smartphones (29%) the most difficult, compared with remote offices (20%) and virtual server environments (18%).
"The survey shows that portable devices are the Achilles heel when it comes to data security for organisations," says Peter Groucutt, Managing Director at Databarracks. "Backup for BYOD and laptops isn't always straight-forward with compatibility issues and lack of resources proving to be the main obstacles to keeping these devices secure."
The Causes of Data loss
Human error remains the chief cause of data loss (41%), a marked increase from 27% since the first Data Health Check in 2008.
Two-thirds of respondents reported data loss from hardware and software failure (67%) compared to a figure of 44% in 2008.
Despite frequently making the headlines, theft and external security breaches, such as hacking, were less likely to cause data loss. However, the impact they had was greater. Whereas theft produced just 3% of total data losses, 7% of respondents said it had the most impact.
Similarly, although external security breaches only accounted for a small proportion of data loss (2%), the repercussions of sensitive corporate information landing in the wrong hands can have more serious implications than, for example, hardware failure.
Disaster Recovery
The Data Health Check also revealed the uptake of online or cloud backup has risen from 23% in 2008 to 39% in 2012. Just 4% of respondents are using tape only for backups, a drop from 20% in 2008.
Alarmingly, 45% of respondents reported restore failures in the last 12 months including 5% admitting more than half of restores had failed, revealing the methods and services to provide backup are often inadequate.
Awareness of the importance of business continuity and disaster recovery plans has increased with more than half (57%) of companies saying their customers encourage or insist they have a Business Continuity Plan compared with 43% in 2008. Yet there is virtually no improvement from UK firms in this regard, with only 42% having a BCP in 2012 compared to 41% in 2008.
"The fact that less than half of businesses surveyed have a business continuity plan in place is worrying, despite there being an increasing demand from their customers to have one," says Groucutt.
"However, what surprised us most about the survey is the number of restore failures experienced by respondents. While many companies have the right intentions, it's evident that the processes or providers they are using aren't delivering. Backup and DR procedures are only as good as the recovery or restore."
Companies can still take the Data Health Check to get a customised report benchmarking their data security policies against other businesses in the UK.