IT professionals fail to protect smartphones

 

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By Matthew Sparkes

Posted on 24 Jun 2009 at 13:01

Security professionals are barely better than the general public at keeping data on their smartphones safe, shows a new survey.

More than a third of IT workers who responded admitted they do not use a password on their work or personal smartphones, despite knowing the amount of sensitive data they contain.

This is only marginally better than the public at large, 40% of whom don't bother to password-protect their phones. The lack of security has been blamed on "password fatigue".

Four out of five admitted that their phones contained business contacts' names and addresses, while around a quarter said that business emails were also stored on their phones.

Worryingly, five per cent also said that credit card information was hidden on their phones, and one percent admitted that they stored passwords and PIN.

"It is alarming to note that the very people who are responsible for IT security are not much better at protecting the information on their business phones than most of their co-workers, who don't necessarily know any better," said Andrew Kahl, of Credant Technologies, the company behind the new survey.

"If a mobile or smartphone goes missing and isn't protected with a password, and contains business names and addresses and other corporate data such as business emails, then the company is immediately in breach of the Data Protection Act by failing to meet some of its principals on electronic data," he warned.