 |
|
The Information Age may have revolutionized America's trade practices and its lead times, but it has compounded security risks for businesses. The compromise of information, denial of services, and a disruption in continuity are among the top security issues facing businesses today. When not secured properly, personal, financial, and medical records are all at risk for inadvertent exposure. Businesses often risk deliberate information leaks as a result of disgruntled or fraudulent individuals, opposition research, computer hackers, or foreign competition. While groups such as these profit from such information leaks, American businesses lose billions of dollars annually. At the end of the Cold War, friend and foe nations re-allocated most of their intelligence collection assets to economic and industrial espionage. A small percentage of mergers, acquisitions and joint ventures serve as some of the means of proprietary theft. The same potential threats from some domestic competitors may be as invisible and no less damaging as the foreign danger. For a company on the cutting edge of its technological field or for a small business, the domino effect of a security breach can lead to devastating and unending personal, professional, legal and financial problems. America's reliance on wireless and electronic technology, paired with its mishandling of documents and property, create fertile grounds for the illicit and invisible acquisition of confidential information. A security threat to personnel, assets, and disruption of business caused by domestic and foreign terrorism, natural disasters, violence in the workplace or in our communities, civil strife, or political uncertainty in foreign trade areas poses a serious problem for American commerce. Better security resides in decision makers' awareness of indicators and warnings signaling a potential threat to their local and global trade resources.
|
|---|
