Pinkerton released its seventh annual survey, Top Security Threats and Security Issues Facing Corporate America, on April 4. The study identified the following top 20 security threats, listed in the order ranked by the survey respondents:
- Workplace violence
- Internet/intranet security
- Business interruption and disaster recovery (tie)
- Fraud/white-collar crime
- Employee selection/screening concerns
- General employee theft
- Unethical business conduct
- Hardware/software theft
- Drugs/alcohol in the workplace
- Sexual harassment/EEOC
- Business espionage/theft of trade secrets
- Property crime (external theft, vandalism)
- “Inadequate security” litigation and “Negligent hiring” litigation (tie)
- Insurance/workers’ compensation fraud
- Terrorism
- Political unrest/regional instability
- Kidnapping/extortion
- Cargo/supply-chain theft
- Product diversion/trans-shipment
- Product contamination/tampering
The survey found that the top management challenge facing security professionals is keeping up with advances in technology, specifically the selection and integration of access control, monitoring, incident management, and other electronic systems to reduce risk. It also reported that although seven of the top 10 security threats are internal (i.e., employee-related) concerns, approximately 20 percent of Fortune 1000 companies said they do not consistently perform criminal-records checks on job applicants.
For more information, visit www.pinkertons.com, phone 800/232-7465 or fax 800/984-4100.
