SecureAuth report finds many UK companies rely solely on passwords

SecureAuth has published a new study that finds that the use of two-step verification has not reached mainstream popularity, as a third of companies with more than a thousand employees said they continue to use password only access, according to a report by IT Pro Portal.

The report, which was conducted by Opinium, finds that two in five IT decision makers (ITDMs) use passwords as their only IT security measure.

The study’s results show a huge growth opportunity in the UK for providers of biometric access control solutions.

The research is based on an online survey of 500 IT decision makers in organizations in the UK with 50 or more employees. Fieldwork was conducted from February 20 to March 4.

Meanwhile, one in five respondents said they ‘don’t know’ how many IT security policies their company has currently implemented.

The report found that the entertainment, hospitality and leisure industry is taking the most risks with its data as 65 percent of respondents from this sector said their organizations use passwords as their only security measure.

Public sector organizations are also taking considerable risks with their data, as the report found that 45 percent of ITDMs from this sector only use passwords.

In fact, the majority (63 percent) of ITDMs from any sector feel that passwords are a sufficient security measure in protecting their data.

“It’s extremely concerning just how many businesses still use passwords as their only method of protection against malicious hackers and the false confidence they seem to have in their current security systems is only further cause for concern,” said Nick Mansour, executive vice president of worldwide sales at SecureAuth. “These organizations who are continuing to blindly use passwords alone to secure their corporate networks need to wake up to the fact that there are a number of inherent risks that come with relying on using passwords to protect valuable data. Organizations of all sizes, from all sectors, should be doing more to address these issues.”

Article Topics

biometrics  |  passwords  |  survey  |  UK