IT security spend soars as fears mount

Despite tight IT spending constraints, the worldwide security software market will increase 18 per cent to $4.3bn in 2002 from $3.6bn in 2001, according to analyst firm Gartner.

Government, education, IT and financial services are expected to increase security software spending, while telecoms and services are projected to cut back.

Gartner explained that concerns following the US terrorist attacks, along with several well-publicised hacks, virus outbreaks and distributed denial of service attacks, will drive increased security spending.

"Financial services companies are critically concerned about the infrastructure-dependent nature of the industry and are anxious to prevent outages, such as those suffered after 11 September, from occurring again," said Gartner analyst Colleen Graham.

She maintained that enterprises are looking at defensive security technologies such as antivirus software, intrusion detection systems and firewalls.

And although technologies such as biometrics and other forms of authentication are getting a great deal of attention, they will not be widely adopted before 2003 because of the high cost of rolling out such systems.

In a separate report, IDC said that the market for managed security services could reach $2.2bn by 2005.

The analyst found that, as small to medium sized companies realise that they do not have the resources or expertise to construct an appropriate defence themselves, they will turn to outside firms for help.

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