The vast majority of IT and security fear insider threats to an organization. And those concerns are justified, as nearly 75% of IT professionals say they are vulnerable to insider threats, according to a report by security and fraud detection firm Gurucul.
The report surveyed more than 650 global IT professionals to identify insider threats to businesses. Insider threats are very much alive, with respondents ranking user error (39%) and malicious insiders (35%) versus an attack (26%) as the most critical problems.
Insider threats have the potential to impact all industries, but the manufacturing sector proved to be most at risk, with 16% of IT professionals reporting they are “extremely vulnerable.” The healthcare sector follows at 10%, according to the report.
Technology respondents said their main concerns are malicious insiders, with the retail industry having high rates of user error and financial services and healthcare having high rates of compromised accounts. Insider threats have increased in recent years due to the volume of corporate data moving to cloud devices and applications, resulting in the need for strong security measures to protect that data.
Only 34% of respondents said they were able to detect threats in real time, according to the report. However, the majority of companies (61%) prioritize identifying and preventing threats to confidential information, and 39% said they focus on predicting and responding.
To stay protected, most organizations (61%) said they monitor users and devices to detect insider threats. Only 39% of respondents said they monitor privileged and service accounts.
