Business travellers more susceptible to data theft, than money

Business travelers, beware! You are more susceptible to be a victim of cyber-crime, compromising your valuable private and corporate data than money, as you travel abroad, a report by software security group Kaspersky Lab found.

The study says that almost a third, or 31 percent, of senior business managers are likely to be a target of cybercrime while abroad. The researchers polled 11,850 people from across Europe, Russia, Latin America, Asia Pacific and the US for the results.

“This shows us that cyber-crime is a real hazard while traveling and employees are putting confidential business information at risk,” said Konstantin Voronkov, Head of Endpoint Product Management at Kaspersky Lab. The base reason why business travelers are more at risk is because of the pressure from work to be online, which is clouding the judgment of business travelers when connecting to the internet. About 59 percent of the senior managers said they try to log on as quickly as possible upon arrival abroad because there is an expectation at work for them to stay connected. Some connect on their hand-held device as soon as they land, using insecure public access WiFi networks.

Over 54 percent of people traveling for work, and up to 62 percent of senior executives make no distinction between their behavior when abroad despite the fact they are a long way from the security of their work communications networks and they are handling employer’s confidential data at work, the study noted.