UK businesses are at risk from serious security breaches in the future from unmanaged cloud services used by employees.
This rise in shadow IT is a growing concern for IT management.
60 per cent of IT decision makers believe the unsanctioned use of cloud services by employees is creating a “culture of shadow IT”.
79 per cent believe there are cloud applications in use within their organisation that they do not know about, according to Fruition Partners’ Defusing a ticking time bomb: How CIOs can bring the cloud under control report.
IT decision makers said that there was a lack of understanding in how this presents a risk to businesses. 89 per cent said that people do not understand the security risks they present when they bypass IT when using cloud services.
Uncontrolled cloud service usage “is a ticking time bomb that needs defusing in the near future”, the report said.
83 per cent of respondents said that the development in cloud technology, dubbed ‘cloud sprawl’, is making the management of IT increasingly complex.
Yet businesses may be adding to security fears at a grass roots level by prioritising ITSM (IT service management) strategies for in-house services while neglecting the management of cloud services.
There is a disparity between ITSM support of in house and cloud services within UK businesses. Usage of ITSM processes for incident management stood at 77 per cent for in house services and 22 per cent cloud. Seven per cent of cloud technology for asset management compared with 65 per cent of in-house services.
Nine in ten IT decision makers have not applied ITSM processes to all cloud services within their organisation. The report said: “Businesses need to do a lot more to get a grip on managing the cloud within their organisations.”
CIOs should focus on how IT services can make better use of ITSM services to support their business strategy, the report suggests.
Improving the technology awareness and culture of the company would reduce the potential risk of using software without IT approval.
To find out more download the CIO Report here.