Recession sees data walk out the door

By Staff Writer for Symantec

Johannesburg, 27 Aug 2009

Almost 40% of South Africans take corporate information with them when they move jobs, according to a survey conducted by Symantec and Moneyweb.

Gordon Love, regional director for Africa at Symantec, believes organisations face a greater risk of data loss because of the difficult economic conditions.

Love says the level of awareness around this kind of theft is relatively low, which creates a challenge for companies in policing the actions of employees when they leave the organisation.

“In many situations, the employees concerned are not aware that they are taking confidential information and, in essence, stealing from their employer. In other situations feelings of resentment towards a former employer may spur them on to take as much information as possible.

“It is critical that not only are employees properly educated about what they can and can't take with them when they leave, but also that those employees that are leaving are properly screened to keep the theft of intellectual information to a minimum.”

The survey revealed that human resources practitioners are not sufficiently equipped when it comes to data security issues, and even when an exit interview is performed, the employee is not quizzed on what documents they are taking with them.

According to Symantec, the results of the South African survey are better than those from a similar survey conducted in the US earlier this year. In the US survey, 59% of employees admitted to taking data from former employers, many of whom stole data intentionally to secure future employment.