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According to a recent Computing Technology Industry Association survey, more than one-quarter-26 percent-of PC users at small- and medium-size businesses reported their productivity was affected by a spyware infection in the last six months. Of those that said they had been hit by a spyware event (including unwilling changes to their home page, disruptive pop-ups and new search bars appearing in their browser), more than one-third reported multiple infections.
The study’s conclusion is that SMBs suffer real and costly effects from spyware infections, network downtime and other common IT problems. Assuming an SMB with 50 employees working at an average cost of $27.50 per hour and IT repairs of between $75 to $100 per hour, spyware infections cost the average SMB $8,239 per year, including nearly $4,000 in lost employee productivity during the infection and approximately $1,200 in lost employee productivity during repair time.
Network downtime, meanwhile, cost the average SMB $4,726 per year, according to the survey, with nearly $4,000 in lost user productivity and a little over $800 in IT labor cost to repair the problem. SMBs that used managed services for network/server monitoring saved 50 percent on average due to shorter repair times and downtime.
Read the full article on eWEEK’s Midmarket site.