Crane on Law by James Crane

Proofpoint has released results from a March 2008 survey of 301 US companies with more than 20,000 employees regarding email and data loss. The highlights from the responses include:

• 41% employ staff to read or analyze outbound email.
• 22% employ staff whose primary job is to read outbound email.
• 38% perform regular audits of outbound email.
• 44% investigated a suspected email leak of confidential information in the past year.
• 23% stated their business was impacted by the exposure of sensitive information in the past year.
• 26% had terminated an employee for violating email policies.
• 27% investigated the exposure of sensitive information due to lost or stolen mobile devices in the past year.
• 21% investigated the exposure of sensitive information via a blog or message board posting.
• 12% investigated the exposure of sensitive information via a media sharing site.
• 12% investigated the exposure of sensitive information via a social networking site.
• 34% had employee email subpoenaed in the past year.

You can find the entire report here. (http://www.proofpoint.com/downloads/Proofpoint-Outbound-Email-and-Data-Loss-Prevention-in-Today's-Enterprise-2008.pdf).

Thanks to Proofpoint for conducting the survey and publishing the results.