Small businesses were largely spared significant business impact or interruption from the recent MyDoom virus and don't seem to be elevating their focus on security in the coming year.
Those are among the key outcomes of the March Small Business Pipeline reader survey focused on IT security. The survey was completed by 227 companies with less than 100 employees.
Asked to rate the impact of MyDoom, more than 90% rated MyDoom said it had minimal or no impact on their companies. That breaks down as 44.5% saying MyDoom had impact although that impact was minimal, while another 46.3% said it had no impact at all.
Anecdotal evidence supports the findings of the survey.
Philadelphia-based GCR Services LLC, a management consultancy with less than 25 employees, isn't placing any greater emphasis on security today than it was before MyDoom, said Richard Wiedenbeck of GCR. "We have personal firewalls and antivirus software. Most of our people are fairly senior level and literate, so they understand what not to open. We've done a good job with education and software," he said. Specific to MyDoom, Wiedenbeck said it had "no impact."
To realize the benefits of cloud-native software, an application must actually be cloud-native—designed to run in the cloud, interacting with disaggregated cloud services, fully manageable as code—to deliver the expected benefits.
By combining resources and expertise, the AI-Enabled ICT Workforce Consortium will offer a blueprint for how industries can adapt to an AI-dominated future.
IT leaders should heed the guidance of cybersecurity insurance providers who think businesses should prioritize security education, incident preparedness, regular internal audits, and ongoing vulnerability scanning and patching.
