Online UK businesses failing to use encryption technologies

Shock findings by the Department of Trade and Industry's Information Security Breaches Survey 2002, has revealed that half of UK businesses operating transactional web-sites do not use encryption technologies to secure transactions and files held on web-servers.

E-business security partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers, Chris Potter presented the findings of the biennial survey in the keynote speech at Infosecurity Europe 2002 conference.

Mr Potter also revealed that:

• Less than one-third of businesses encrypt files such as credit card details, leaving customer details and confidential company information wide open to be accessed and utilised;



• One-third of businesses fail to authenticate customers' identities on-line prior to transaction completion;



• More than half of companies do not check credit card authorisation on-line;



• Over a third of web-sites have no firewall, giving hackers an easy ride when it comes to obtaining critical business and financial information.

Chris Potter added: "There's no doubt that in the UK e-business is rapidly becoming how normal business is done. However, consumers' and companies' increased enthusiasm for transactional websites is not being backed by the implementation of effective information security measures."

The survey showed a significant rise in e-business activity in the UK. Three-quarters of UK businesses now have a website and enable staff to email other organisations and browse their websites.

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