According to a survey conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry among 1,000 respondents, UK companies are falling short in terms of protecting data. The DTI has thus expressed concern about this, in light of the increasing level of e-commerce activities and business conducted online. The risk of client data and proprietary company information being stolen continues to be very high.
According to the study, most large companies take an active role in securing data and customer information that it has. However, most smaller companies do not have such a proactive stance on network and data protection.
The most vulnerable, in this case, would be the companies that accept financial transactions online. Information such as credit card numbers and client contact information and addresses are potential targets by hackers. Among the companies that accepted online financial transactions, more than one third did not encrypt their data transmissions and databases. And among companies that use voice-over-internet protocol for voice calls, half did not consider possible security risks.