In developed economies, 95% of IT professionals face challenges securing and supporting Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) mainly because employees are careless.
Based on finding of a study by Check Point Software Technologies — which covered 800 respondents in the United States, Australia, Canada, Germany, and United Kingdom — nearly two-thirds believed that recent high-profile breaches of customer data were likely due to employee carelessness.
However, while careless employees as the weakest link into businesses, 91% of IT professionals saw an increase in the number of personal mobile devices connecting to their networks over the past two years.
In 2014, 56% of those surveyed managed business data on employee-owned devices, up from 37% in 2013.
Nearly all (98%) respondents expressed their concern about the impact of a mobile security incident, with the greatest concern being the potential for lost and stolen information.
Also this year, respondents saw an increase in remediation costs for mobile security incidents. Of the IT executives surveyed, 42% noted that mobile security incidents cost their organizations more than $250,000.
Android continued to be perceived as having the greatest security risks, which increased from 49% in 2013 to 64% this year, as the platform with greatest perceived security risk.