IT directors fear the sack over email security

Forty-one per cent of IT directors said that an email leak would cost them their job

More than a third of IT directors fear losing their jobs if confidential information sent by email is leaked or accidentally read by someone other than the intended recipient, according to a report issued today.

Forty-one per cent of respondents said in a poll carried out by Safe-Post that such a leak would cost them their job, with that figure rising to 57 per cent for IT directors in the financial services sector. 

Safe-Post said that the situation is "worrying" given that 93 per cent of businesses now rely on email as their main method of written communication.

"The problem is that today's email delivery systems are inherently insecure because when any email is sent, a copy is made and stored every time it passes through a server," said a spokesman for Safe-Post.

"Anyone with access to any of those servers could read a copy of the email, resulting in the leak of important corporate information."

The study also found that almost a third of businesses experience email loss or delay at least fortnightly.

Financial services were the worst hit, with 14 per cent finding emails arriving after a long delay or not at all every day.