Users, IT Disagree On Spam's Impact

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June 16, 2004 (10:43 AM EDT)

More than half of American computer users think spam isn't a problem in their workplace, putting them at odds with IT managers, a security firm said Tuesday.

According to a survey conducted by Insight Express, and sponsored by Symantec, 50.8 percent of end users don't see workplace spam as a big deal. Of the IT managers polled, however, 79.1 percent believe spam is a problem now, and will continue to be through at least 2007.

When the survey drilled down, it found the same disconnect between users' and IT's view of spam. Fewer IT managers, for instance, described their company's current spam status as "under control" (56 percent for IT, 68 percent for users), and more managers categorized the situation as "barely under control" (34 percent for IT, 23 percent for users).

One thing that users and IT staff do have in common is their skepticism that government anti-spam efforts will solve the problem. Fewer than 1 in 4 end users or managers thought that government will have a big impact on spam.

Over a fifth of the IT managers said that spam makes up more than 31 percent of their company's total e-mail traffic, and in general, they bemoaned the toll that spam takes on their resources. Over 70 percent, for example, pointed to the costs of lost bandwidth due to spam, while 60 percent named server and storage space costs as a concern.

As if spam wasn't bad enough, IT managers also see phishing and spyware as looming problems. Some 59 percent acknowledged that spyware was a moderate to very severe problem in their company, while 54.5 percent said the same thing about phishing attacks.