Employees working in London’s financial services district are unaware of or do not care about basic IT security policy, according to the results of a Valentine’s Day experiment.
On Tuesday, IT skills firm The Training Camp handed out CDs to commuters as they entered the City, informing recipients that the disks contained a special Valentine’s Day promotion.
But the CDs contained nothing more than code which informed The Training Camp how many of the recipients had tried to open the CD.
The CD packaging even contained a clear warning about installing third-party software and acting in breach of company acceptable-use policies, but that didn’t deter many individuals.
Employees of a major retail bank and two global insurers were among those duped by the experiment.
Rob Chapman, chief executive of the Training Camp, said: “Fortunately, these CDs contained nothing harmful. No personal or corporate data was transmitted due to the actions of these individuals, but the fact remains that this could have been someone wanting to cause havoc in the City.
“Employees have to recognise they are the first and easiest route into a company’s network.”
