Study: Physical security critical to IT resilience

The European survey, conducted by Global Switch, found that 86 per cent of financial institutions polled think a breach in physical security is the most important consideration when protecting their IT environment.

Banks and insurance companies in particular, view this as the central concern when protecting their corporate environment. Access to diverse power supplies ranked second and control of temperature and humidity came third.

In contrast 57 per cent of online businesses believe security staff are significant in providing protection to their IT environment. The research adds that 55 per cent of online companies store their data in traditional office buildings, with employees there posing the greatest risk to stealing sensitive data.

Furthermore, the research found that almost 90 per cent of companies surveyed in the UK and France deem physical security as critical to IT resilience. Conversely, organisations in the Netherlands, Spain and Germany are the least likely to protect their corporate infrastructure against intrusion and malicious attacks.

Julian King, commercial director of Global Switch said: "The strong results from the financial sector and the UK in particular, indicate a high awareness of the impact that high quality physical environments have on business continuity.

"Protecting against intrusion is critical and should not be overlooked in favour of the more popular discussions over IT and network security. They should all have equal consideration.

"Limiting access to authorised personnel and providing a highly controlled environment will reduce the likelihood of both human error and malicious attack."

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