Swedish cell phone maker Ericsson, which also makes guided missile technology (who knew?! I wonder if Qualcomm is considering entry into the smart bomb market?!), has suffered some serious security breaches in the past few years. First a consultant stole information from the intranet and then five other employees were nabbed in a big espionage scandal.
Reporter.gr provides accounts (see Greece: The "Athens Gate" part of Ericsson's spy scandal says MP)of the Hungarian IT consultant who worked on contract for Ericsson, stole company information from the intranet and then tried to sell it on the Internet! (Not the sharpest knife in the drawer). According to Reporter, the man was holding out for a full-time job but turned to theft when he didn’t get it. Csaba Richter, a 26-year-old consultant, pleaded guilty to stealing documents on Ericsson's intranet and was sentenced to 3-years in jail.
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Of course, this story should be of no surprise. It’s not the first. The biggest threat to your intranet is not the outside world, but those inside that use it everyday.
A recent survey reveals that business leaders believe the greatest threat is not from a malicious external attack, but rather from the hands of an uninformed employee. The research showed that 46% percent of respondents said that employees who accidentally download security-compromising viruses, spyware or adware pose a greater data security risk to a company than external agents like hackers, cited next at 40%.
Of the 556 executives interviewed in a recent Fusepoint/Sun Microsystems/Leger Marketing survey, 55% say that their confidential and private data is at risk of an attack. 55% say their confidential data is at risk. This despite the fact that most consumers (58%) would immediately terminate their relationship with a company that compromised their personal information.
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Email and intranet are biggest wireless threats