More Than Half of Ex-Employees Admit to Steal Company

Symantec Corp. and the Ponemon Institute, a leading privacy and
information management research firm, today announced the findings of
a joint survey of employees who lost or left a job in 2008, which
revealed 59 percent of ex-employees admit to stealing confidential
company information, such as customer contact lists. The results also
show that if respondents' companies had implemented better data loss
prevention policies and technologies, many of those instances of data
theft could have been prevented.

Of respondents who admitted to taking company data, 61 percent also
reported having an unfavorable view of their former employer. The most
commonly identified kinds of records taken included e-mail lists,
employee records, customer information including contact lists, and
non-financial information. Although respondents were spread across
many different industries, the highest percentage of survey responses
came from the financial services industry.

Additional Survey Findings

53 percent of respondents downloaded information onto a CD or DVD,
42 percent onto a USB drive and 38 percent sent attachments to a
personal e-mail account.
79 percent of respondents took data without an employer's permission.
82 percent of respondents said their employers did not perform an
audit or review of paper or electronic documents before the respondent
left his/her job.
24 percent of respondents had access to their employer's computer
system or network after their departure from the company.