Cloud-Client Enterprise Security Impact Report Increased Protection at a Lower Cost

Cloud-Client Enterprise Security Impact Report
Increased Protection at a Lower Cost sponsored by
An Osterman Research White Paper
Published January 2009 SPONSORED BY
Phone: +1 877-21-TRENDsponsored by www.trendmicro.com/go/smartprotection
sponsored by Osterman Research, Inc. . P.O. Box 1058 . Black Diamond, Washington 98010-1058 Phone: +1 253 630 5839 . Fax: +1 866 842 3274 . info@ostermanresearch.com . www.ostermanresearch.com Cloud-Client Enterprise Security Impact Report
Improved Security Saves 40% in Security Management Costs
Malware, spam, and other Web threats are a clear and present danger to organizations of every size and in every industry. The consequences of malware infecting an organization are numerous and include a wide variety of problems, ranging from minor annoyances to the destruction of data. Worse, data-stealing malware, such as keystroke loggers, can enter a network, intercept sensitive or confidential content, and send it to unauthorized parties. Further, this information can be stolen by merely opening a Web page on malicious, fraudulent, or hijacked sites. The Web has become the primary means of distributing malware, infecting users that follow dangerous links in spam, follow poisoned search results, or visit hijacked legitimate sites. Defending against malware can make it difficult to conduct business safely. Compounding the problem is the fact that malware is becoming more virulent, more stealthy and more difficult to detect. Worse, the lifecycle for many malware variants can now be Each year in an enterprise measured in minutes, not hours or 5,000 days - many variants appear, do their of employees: damage and then disappear long before new pattern files or signatures 2/3 of endpoints can be deployed and propagated to servers and clients on the network. get infected However, if an organization could dramatically reduce the length of $197,300 is lost time required to access threat cleaning endpoints intelligence using in-the-cloud reputation databases to block new malware and spam variants before $160,300 is lost they even reach the network, it could reduce the rate of endpoint infection, in employee productivity lower its security management and lost productivity costs, and reduce >$100,000the likelihood of security breaches. is lost Further, if an organization opted to by >10% of companies for combine these activities with the each security breach suffered consolidation of its content security infrastructure to just a single vendor, the advantages and cost savings But they can would be even greater. save almost $60 per employee This white paper discusses the many each year if using a benefits of faster access to threat comprehensive content intelligence, using a cloud-client architecture for immediate security solution with a protection, as well as the benefits to cloud-client architecture instead enterprises of consolidating to a of their conventional approach
©2009 Osterman Research, Inc. 1 Cloud-Client Enterprise Security Impact Report
single vendor for content security infrastructure. Together these benefits can save over 40% of an enterprise's total security management costs, not to mention savings on reduced productivity loss, a reduced number of security breaches and other, less tangible costs. The paper discusses the cost model developed by Osterman Research specifically for this white paper, as well as the solutions offered by Trend Micro that can significantly improve an organization's content security infrastructure. METHODOLOGY AND BACKGROUND As part of this white paper development effort, Osterman Research completed a survey with more than 100 respondents during December 2008 on the number of endpoints (clients and servers) in each organization, the amount of time spent on IT labor, the frequency with which malware pattern files/signatures are updated and a variety of other issues to better understand the impacts of a cloud-client architecture and vendor consolidation for content security. The organizations surveyed, which are based in North America and Europe, have a median of 4,500 employees. For the purposes of this paper, we will use examples based on 5,000 employees.
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