Centrify has released a survey warning that the presence of wearables in the enterprise poses a growing concern for IT security.
To undertake this survey, Centrify polled more than 100 randomly-chosen attendees at last month’s RSA security conference in San Francisco.
The survey found that while more than two thirds of wearable owners use no login protection and more than half use their devices to access business data, theft was ranked as the top security concern by 42 per cent of respondents.
“As wearables become more common in the enterprise, IT departments must take serious steps to protect them as carefully as they do laptops and smartphones,” said David McNeely, VP of Product Strategy for Centrify, who is visiting Australia next week for the Connect Expo event in Melbourne.
“Wearables are deceptively private. Owners may feel that due to their ongoing proximity to the body, they’re less likely to fall into the wrong hands. However, hackers don’t need to take physical possession of a device in order to exploit a hole in security. The best news is that solutions already exist that can easily wrap wearables into the identity management picture.”
Results of the Centrify wearables survey identified that:
- 69 per cent of wearable device owners say they forego login credentials, such as PINs, passwords, fingerprint scanners and voice recognition, to access their devices.
- 56 per cent of wearable owners use their devices to access business apps such as Box, Slack, Dropbox, Salesforce, Google Docs, Microsoft Office or a combination of those.
- Perhaps most alarming, despite the lack of login credentials and ready access to corporate data, 42 per cent of wearable owners cite identity theft as their top security concern when it comes to their devices.
- Lack of IT management and device control comes in second (34 per cent) and a general increase in breaches of sensitive work data or information comes in third (22 per cent).
For more information about this Centrify survey, or to request an interview with David McNeely when he is in Melbourne and Sydney next week, please call John Harris on 08 8431 4000 or email john@impress.com.au.
About Centrify
Centrify is the leader in securing enterprise identities against cyberthreats that target today’s hybrid IT environment of cloud, mobile and on-premises. The Centrify Identity Platform protects against the leading point of attack used in data breaches ― compromised credentials — by securing an enterprise’s internal and external users as well as its privileged accounts. Centrify delivers stronger security, continuous compliance and enhanced user productivity through single sign-on, multi-factor authentication, mobile and Mac management, privileged access security and session monitoring. Centrify is trusted by over 5000 customers, including more than half of the Fortune 50.
