Users must be protected from themselves

Analyst firm Gartner has released a list of best practices to help firms ensure data security.

It recommends deployment of content monitoring and filtering tools to prevent sensitive data leaving the network, whether accidentally or maliciously, and encryption for back-up tapes and laptops in case they are lost or stolen.

It also advises firms to ensure all workstations are kept up to date with anti-spyware and that data downloaded to portable storage media is controlled and encrypted.

Gartner analyst Ant Allan said, "These are various approaches we see as being potentially useful. What's most appropriate will depend on [firms'] risks, so if there are a large number of mobile workers then encryption will be more important."

Allan added that data breaches are often accidental, so tools should deployed to "protect users from themselves". "Awareness of how to prevent information breaches is less than we'd hope but probably not as much as we fear," he said.