IT managers fear data loss

Yet survey says a third do not have data loss strategies

86 per cent of IT managers fear data loss

Over two thirds (86 per cent) of IT managers fear that data loss will fundamentally damage their company, according to new research.

A study by vendor CA found a third of those surveyed have not implemented a suitable service level agreement (SLA) strategy to mitigate the risk of this data loss.

The research, carried out on behalf of CA by Freeform Dynamics, found IT managers consider loss of business-critical data and downtime of key IT systems as the greatest risk they face in IT planning.

The study also says the proliferation of data represents a major challenge for many IT managers and 62 per cent expressed concerns about managing distributed data storage.

About a third of IT managers lack faith in decentralised storage of business-critical information on servers, PCs and mobile devices.

The study highlighted the gap between IT manager's awareness of risk and the action they take.

While 86 per cent of respondents stress that losing business data would hurt their company, 32 per cent have not implemented a suitable SLA strategy to mitigate the risk of data loss and set acceptable recovery time objectives.

Defining service levels is an essential element of efficient risk management according to Duncan Fisken, vice president at CA.

‘Managers who fail to develop this understanding won't be able to design or implement appropriate data storage, management, and recovery processes,’ said Fisken.