ITers Are Spying on You

NEWTON, Mass. -- Whilst you sit there innocently working away, little do you realize that a third of your IT colleagues have been snooping around the network, looking at highly confidential information, such as salary details, M & A plans, peoples personal emails, board meeting minutes and other personal information. That’s the findings of a survey released today by Cyber-Ark® Software, specialists in privileged identity management and digital vaulting solutions, who carried out the research at the recent Infosecurity Expo 2008, amongst 300 senior IT professionals (mainly from companies employing over 1000+ employees), as part of their annual survey into “Trust, Security and Passwords”. One third of the survey sampled admitted to using their privileged rights to access information that is confidential or sensitive by using the administrative passwords as a means of peeking at information that they are not privy to.

Ever Wonder What Your IT Department is Up To?

When asked if they had accessed information that was not relevant to their role 47 percent admitted they had!

Mark Fullbrook, UK Director of Cyber-Ark says “When it comes down to it, IT has essentially enabled snooping to happen! It’s easy – all you need is access to the right passwords or privileged accounts and you’re privy to everything that’s going on within your company. Gone are the days when you had to photocopy sheets of information with your customer database on it, or pick the lock to the salaries drawer! In some organizations there is little understanding or lack of controls in place to manage workers access to systems. For most people, administrative passwords are a seemingly innocuous tool used by the IT department to update or amend systems. To those “in the know” they are the keys to the kingdom and if unprotected or fall into the wrong hands wield a great deal of power. This could include highly sensitive information such as merger plans, the CEO’s emails, company accounts, marketing plans, legal records, R & D plans etc.”

Cyber-Ark Software Ltd.