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Enterprise Security Spending Trends
Enterprise Security Spending Trends
• Rapid expansion of today’s IT strategies implies collateral expansion of IT security
• After slower 2008–2010, security investment returns in 2011
• Mobility and cloud computing already started driving shifts in security spending last year
• Smaller organizations might want to get with the program!
• Though all sizes of enterprises are nicely investing in continuity again
IT Investment Patterns Research
• A twice-yearly study- June 2010- December 2010
• ~700 respondents each survey, involved in IT budgeting at their organizations
• Only respondents knowledgeable about a given budget line were asked about it
• 75 budget lines covered in eight areas; security area has 11 budget lines
North American organizations (N=699–705).Source: IT Investment Patterns, CIO Insight
The Affect of IT Strategies
Most of the biggest trends in the IT infrastructure today have a deep impact on security. Consolidation and virtualization engender access control and identity issues. Unified communications adds endpoint and data security concerns. And cloud computing intensifies security issues across the full spectrum. All of these areas are showing strong growth in the enterprise today.
Cloud-Related Security Budgets Are Growing Strongest
Cloud computing is driving shifts in security investment towards access control, security management, identity management, and firewalls, all of which show indications of growing most strongly in 2011 compared to other budget areas. The data here shows this for large enterprises.
Cloud-Related Security Budgets Are Growing Strongest
But the same is equally true of midrange organizations as well—in the case of management budgets, even more so than large enterprises. Midrange firms also have some catching up to do after slow growth during the Great Recession, and show more growth in 2011 generally than bigger firms do.
Generally speaking, fewer midrange firms tend to budget each area than large firms.
But in some cases, this shortfall is extreme.
Midrange Firms Acting Like Small Firms
Large Firms Overspent in 2010
500+ employees• Firewalls/VPNs averaged 6.2% over budget in 2010
• Identity management: +5.8%
• Authentication management and security management: +5.6%
(Only two security areas were less than 4% over.)
50–499 employees• Firewalls/VPNs averaged 3.8% over budget in 2010
• Antivirus: +3.0%
• Security Management: +2.9%
• Encryption: +2.2%
What the IT Investment Patterns Research Tells Us
• In the age of the mobile cloud, pay closest attention to access control, authentication, and the various management areas
• And to the routine old firewall too—which may surprise you
• If you’re in a smaller organization, make sure you’re not underinvesting
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Security Budgets Face Pressure from Shift to Cloud Computing, Mobility
The shift toward a more mobile workforce and the cloud computing infrastructure to support this new approach to enterprise computing is already under way. However, these two critical trends are also forcing businesses, both large enterprises and smaller firms, to rethink IT security, especially what technologies the IT department should invest in for the future. New research from Ziff Davis Enterprise shows that not only are businesses of all sizes investing in cloud infrastructures, but this shift is also forcing IT security professionals to weigh the benefits of technologies such as access control, security management, identity management and firewalls. What is making these decisions even more complicated is that IT budgets are beginning to expand after a two-year hiatus. Now that IT departments have more cash, it’s easy to invest too much in the wrong type of security tools. Is your business or IT department investing in the right security technology to support its cloud infrastructure? This new research could help your business when it wants to wisely invest in IT security.