Roaming workers up to no good on the web

In data released today, ScanSafe has confirmed the long held belief that employees are engaging in risky web surfing when working outside the office. The company found that roaming laptop users are much more likely to try to access questionable content putting employers at risk of legal liability and exposure to malware.

An analysis of eight billion web requests processed by the company in March confirms that roaming workers visit these websites significantly more when they are outside the office.

Specifically, roaming workers visit the following sites more than their colleagues in the office:

• Illegal file sharing sites – 8.5 times more often
• Porn sites – 2.5 times more often
• Sites with extremely graphic content – 5.2 times more often
• Illegal activities sites – 3.9 times more often.

Interestingly, there is one category of sites that remote employees are less likely to visit when they are out of the office – banking sites. According to the data, roaming employees are 66 per cent less likely to visit an online banking site.

Many companies are not securing web use for their remote workers. Extending security solutions for roaming laptop users is complex, hard to maintain, expensive, and falls short of offering full “roaming’ protection.