(3-Dec-10) The good news, according to Symantec’s David Stewart, product marketing manager for managed security services, is that enterprises’ security budgets are holding steady. Whatever cuts were made seem to have largely been made in 2008 and early 2009, and there has been little erosion since. The bad news is that there has been no equivalent freeze in malware propagation.
“The threat environment is just getting worse and worse,” says Stewart. “We’re producing 15,000 signatures per day. Malware is just increasing exponentially, and it’s a daunting task, even for us.” It’s no wonder that Symantec’s (www.symantec.com) survey for its “2010 State of Enterprise Security Report” found that 100% of respondents had experienced “cyber losses” in 2009, including customer information, downtime, and intellectual property theft. The average loss per enterprise was measured at $2 million annually. Clearly, businesses need security expertise on hand now more than ever.
Unfortunately, SMEs generally can’t afford highly trained IT security staff—or even a single dedicated security manager. In such circumstances, what should be done?