Of the 73 per cent of businesses that suffered a spyware invasion in 2006, 19 per cent were unable to identify the source, raising the question of how organisations can thoroughly protect their networks, when they clearly haven't identified all areas of risk.

In addition, of the 57 per cent of businesses that have banned Instant Messaging (IM) in the workplace, nearly 70 per cent use methods to enforce the ban that are obsolete, easy to circumvent or ignore. These are just some of the findings in a survey on real-time threats carried out by Peapod, in conjunction with FaceTime Communications.

The survey of 203 UK organisations from a broad range of industries including central and local government, healthcare, financial services and manufacturing, looks at the extent of the dangers of spyware, internal usage policies and their deployment, alongside how IM technology is secured in the workplace.

Interestingly, despite the fact that spyware entering the network through IM channels is on the rise, many organisations place themselves at risk by not recognising that IM networks and aggregators are designed to evade security controls such as blocking ports. Most respondents to the survey stated that they adopt port blocking techniques to control IM, but this method is in direct conflict with how such applications work, since many IM applications are port evasive, often even tunnelling through HTTP to find an alternative route if the default one is blocked.

The survey also showed that 3 out of 4 UK organisations that do allow IM, do not consider the need to manage it, despite the fact that the law views the tool as on an equal footing with email. In addition to allowing users to release confidential documentation potentially undetected, IM can be used to form contracts or be the communication mechanism for harassment, defamation and bullying.

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www.peapod.co.uk

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