Almost one third of UK directors have stolen confidential information from their employer, research has revealed.
About 29% of the 1,385 employees surveyed by Hummingbird IT company and YouGov pollsters admitted to taking confidential company material when they left for a new job.
Company training manuals and procedure handbooks were found to be the most popular items, followed by financial data and client reports.
Women were found to be less likely to thieve than their male colleagues, however. More than a third (37%) said they would never pinch unauthorised information compared with just a quarter of men.
Donal Casey, security consultant at Morse integration company, said employers should tighten up security measures on confidential information.
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“Businesses should make sure that only those that need to be able to access confidential data are able to,” he said.
“And they should ensure there are audit trails in place so that if data is stolen or leaked you can trace back to the source of the leak.”
