OREANDA-NEWS. August 29, 2012. According to research conducted by B2B International in July 2012 in collaboration with Kaspersky Lab, companies already recognize cyber-threats as one of the most pressing business problems. But are they ready to protect themselves against these threats? According to the survey, in 41% of cases the answer is ‘no’: corporate infrastructure lacks the necessary protection to handle online attacks.

The situation is no better when the focus shifts to cybercrime-related threats. In particular, 48% companies are insufficiently protected against the theft of intellectual property, which is commonly carried out online. 51% of IT professionals surveyed are sure that their system protection infrastructure would be powerless in the face of a serious attempt at industrial espionage.

Employee awareness is a crucial factor in the battle against modern malware and its potential consequences. Yet here too, things are no better: 31% of the specialists surveyed are not fully aware of today’s Trojans, nor of the means used to conduct targeted attacks on companies. Only 27% of business representatives had heard about the first example of the modern cyber-weapon – Stuxnet; fewer still knew about the Trojan Duqu designed for the targeted collection of confidential information (13%).

Knowledge among IT professionals about modern threats is every bit as vital as training employees in the main rules of computer security. Deploying systematic security policies and ensuring compliance with them also helps to protect businesses against the careless activities of employees. In particular, Kaspersky Endpoint Security 8 for Windows assists in controlling and restricting employees’ Internet activities, the use of applications and connections to external devices. For more information on Endpoint Control see this infographic.