KnowBe4 has released a new report showing half of the employees at shadow IT companies use unauthorised file services to complete their work.
The security awareness training and simulated phishing platform adds that this is a serious risk for companies in the sector.
KnowBe4 says the research report looks at the prevalence of two common insecure practices using survey responses from more than 435,000 participants across global regions and industries.
The first analysis covers the use of unauthorised cloud services to store information and communicate in the workplace. The second analysis reviews the prevalence of downloading content through unauthorised file-sharing networks using work computers.
The company says one significant issue to note is that the Asia and Oceania regions have concerningly high rates of both practices.
In contrast, Africa is consistently the best performing in these areas.
Additionally, finance and technology-based industries are comparatively better than many other industries, while construction, manufacturing, educational and government-based organisations are the poorest performing.
“The findings from this research are very concerning because employees are exhibiting insecure behaviours that are putting their organisations at significant risk,” KnowBe4 chief research officer Kai Roer says.
“The concept of shadow IT has a direct impact on the level of security culture exhibited at an organisation.
“To combat shadow IT,…
