Education sector ‘at risk of document security breaches'

Released 08/09/2011

Education joins the ranks of sectors at risk of document compliant breaches, along with health and financial services

Educational organisations are most at risk for document breaches, with 38% admitting they

Business critical documentation inside educational organisations is increasingly at risk of being lost or in breach of essential document compliance regulations according to new findings.

The Ricoh Process Efficiency Index, a study conducted by Coleman Parkes Research, included interviews with 458 senior executives across six vertical market sectors in Europe, including education.

It showed that 31% of all European organisations continue to lose important documents while 24% have no audit trail facilities in place to track and monitor the movement of business critical information at all.

"The dynamics facing the future workplace such as globalisation and changing demographics are fuelling information overload," commented Carsten Bruhn, executive vice president of Ricoh Europe.

"By 2020 digital information will grow by a factor of 30 and the number of files by a factor of 60. This ‘big data' concept, combined with the changing culture of the workplace, mean that effective information management and compliance with document regulations is of paramount importance to organisations across all vertical markets."

He continued: "However, these findings reveal that many European organisations admit to still not managing their business critical document processes effectively, leaving them unprepared for the future."

Shockingly, 31% of all European organisations are still prone to losing important documents.

Organisations in the education sector were found to be most at risk with 38% admitting they occasionally lose or misplace business critical information compared with 14% in the legal sector.

Over half of all organisations (52%) said that the biggest impact was significant business process delays.

Additional impacts range from damaged reputation to non-payment of invoices, loss of business critical information, compliance breaches and unsatisfied clients.

Bruhn added: "At a time when organisations across all vertical sectors need to be improving their overall operational efficiencies in order to compete in the global marketplace, the study shows that many are unnecessarily exposing themselves to risk."

Read the full study at www.ricoh-europe.com/thoughtleadership.

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