At The Security Standard conference held in Chicago on September 10th and 11th, experts met to discuss business security threats. Insider threats gained momentum this year in terms of the attention it was given by security professionals.

That is not to say that ongoing threats are no longer an issue.  Malware and hackers are still of concern to businesses worried about infected networks or data breaches. Survey results from the conference show that outsiders still account for more security issues, but the insider threat of data leakage is a growing concern.

Though different companies face different threats, threats related to financial crimes and identity theft are of high priority. It’s not simply about facing the threats, it’s now also about making sure organizations are compliant.

Nick Selby, senior analyst and director of The 451 Group’s enterprise security practice, indicates that 98% of data leaked is the result of “stupidity or accident,” not malicious intent. Policies and technology solutions can better deal with the “stupid” or “accidental” data leaks but they are unable to address intentional threats.

Attendees at the conference expressed concerns over mistakes made by employees and the challenges of tracking information sent outside the network. Experts advised companies to consider physical threats to data security (information tossed out or recycled without shredding) that have been at times overlooked by IT security departments.  On that note, it is important that organizations have an effective lifecycle management program and use tools like Absolute’s Computrace Data Protection to effectively remove all sensitive information from machines at the end of their lifecycle.

Via PC World ; Tags: internal threats, it security, data security, data leak, data leakage, security, identity theft