Germans Are More Confident About Data Protection

In German companies, employees and IT experts are more optimistic about cyber attacks and insider threats, according to the Ponemon Institute study “Differences in Security Practices and Vigilance Across UK, France, Germany and US” commissioned by Varonis.

According to the study, employees in France, Great Britain and the United States agree that negligent insiders pose a greater risk to company data than attackers from outside or maliciously acting insiders.

Data protection

Half of the German study participants stated that they took all necessary measures to protect the company data they used. This was only 39 percent in Great Britain, 37 percent in France and 35 percent in the USA. 44 percent of German employees also say that their company strictly enforces policies against misuse or unauthorized access to data. In the UK (35 percent), the USA (32 percent) and France (29 percent), however, this number was significantly lower.

Allocation of rights

39 percent of IT experts in Germany believe that their organization rigorously implements the principle of minimum rights for file shares and other shared data storage, which means that employees only access the company data that they really need. Only 29 percent of respondents in the United States, 25 in France and 23 in the United Kingdom agree.

Ransomware

Although German IT experts were the least likely to state in the study that their company has already been victim of ransomware (12 percent compared to 17 percent in the US, 16 percent in France and 13 percent in the UK), ransomware prepares them in a country comparison most headache: 83 percent of German IT experts were very or extremely concerned about this. In France this number was 80 percent, in the USA 77 and in Great Britain 63 percent.

The number of companies and organizations whose data has been lost or stolen in the past two years is highest in the United States (82 percent), followed by France (80 percent), the United Kingdom (76 percent) and Germany (64 percent).

Less productivity, more security

In a country comparison, most end users (30 percent) and IT employees (45 percent) in German organizations believe that their management would accept less productivity if this would reduce security risks. In contrast, respondents were less optimistic in Great Britain (25 percent of employees, 34 percent of IT experts), in France (23 percent of employees, 35 percent of IT experts) and the USA (21 percent of employees, 30 percent of IT experts) IT experts).

Top security threats

The security threats that most worried IT experts were in different places in each of the four countries:

• Germany: External attackers who steal insider credentials (66 percent); Malware (46 percent); Suppliers with bad intentions (41 percent). Negligent insiders were in fourth place with 36 percent.
• France: negligent insiders (67 percent); External attackers stealing insider credentials (53 percent); Suppliers with bad intentions (40 percent)
• Great Britain: Negligent insiders (56 percent); External attackers stealing insider credentials (60 percent); Malware (44 percent)
• USA: Negligent insiders (61 percent); External attackers stealing insider credentials (55 percent); Malware (47 percent)

To the study

The study "Differences in Security Practices and Vigilance Across UK, France, Germany and US" was carried out by the Ponemon Institute and sponsored by Varonis Systems. Among the 3,027 study participants were 1,109 from the USA, 670 from Germany, 655 from Great Britain and 593 from France. All respondents work for organizations with a few dozen to tens of thousands of employees from a variety of industries, including financial services, the public sector, healthcare and life sciences, commerce, industry, technology and software.