Trend Micro Launches Online Security Assessment Tools

The toolkit is designed to help businesses assess the risk they face from cyber-attacks and mobile security holes.

Cloud security specialist Trend Micro announced the Nov. 27 launch its free Online Security Assessment Tools for cloud, cyber and mobile security to provide organizations with an idea of their current business security posture with respect to cloud adoption, consumerization of IT, bring your own device (BYOD) programs and targeted attacks.

By answering 25 yes-or-no questions, the tool offers an assessment of a company's current security posture, provides a comparison against industry averages and offers suggestions on how to improve current security practices. Results are provided in five areas of security, including protection, responsiveness, organization, expertise and visibility.

"We have seen a real need for a tool that assists companies with their move to the cloud and increases the need to access company resources via mobile or BYOD adoption with many devices, including personal computers, mobile and tablet devices," Trend Micro senior manager of core technology marketing Jon Clay said. "Certainly there exists a heightened awareness around security with cloud adoption as well as APT/Targeted attacks."

The company recently conducted the same assessments with organizations of 500 or more employees in nine countries, including the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Germany and Australia.

According to these assessments, U.S. organizations are the most cloud-ready and Japanese organizations are the least cloud-ready, scoring 4.5 and 2.3 out of 5. In addition, U.S. and Canadian organizations are the highest-ranked when it comes to having a cloud security policy shared regularly with employees.

The report found approximately 89 percent of U.S. organizations encrypt their important data in the cloud, with only about 39.6 percent of Japanese organizations encrypting their cloud data.

The results also indicated the U.S. and Canada are the most ready to defend themselves against cyber-attacks, scoring 3.3 and 4.6 out of 5. On average across these nine countries, approximately 84.7 percent of organizations reported a documented process for handling an attack, with approximately 93 percent of U.S. and approximately 64.1 percent of Japanese organizations reporting having such a process.

Also on average across these nine countries, approximately 86.5 percent of organizations share their security policies regularly with employees, with approximately 95.6 percent of Canadian and 73.8 percent of Japanese organizations sharing such policies with employees regularly.

However, the report noted that when it comes to targeted attacks, a smaller percentage of organizations--about 75.6 percent on average--educate their employees. In this category, the U.K. led the way with approximately 87.3 percent, and Japan fell to the back with about 51.8 percent being proactive about education.