Raising Awareness Key To Thwarting Spyware

A new study by InformationWeek Research on spam, spyware, and adware makes it clear that companies will have to rely on increasing user awareness about not opening suspicious-looking E-mails, visiting unfamiliar Web sites, or downloading and running "free" games and software from the Internet if they want to keep their PCs healthily humming along. With the majority of the 400 business-technology professionals surveyed confirming that their organizations have been the targets of spyware and adware in the last 12 months, and with respondents estimating that half the E-mail their organization receives is spam, user education must be a priority.

Considering the stealthy and insidious nature of spyware, it's not surprising that most of the respondents disagree that spyware would be less of a problem if users took the time to thoroughly read user agreements. Time would be better spent making sure employees understand the risks of what they might consider harmless activities. Home-office workers and road warriors come under particular scrutiny here. The majority of respondents believe employees working outside the protection of their corporate network's stringent security polices and firewalls place them at greater risk of getting infected with troublesome spyware.

<1-- You can read more about the survey results in the Jan. 17 issue of InformationWeek. -->

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