67% of European organisations admit that cloud based apps, installed without the knowledge of their IT department, could pose security threats to the organisations.
According to Centrify’s ‘Cloud Expo Europe poll’, employees download apps without going through their company’s formal IT procurement process, which is termed as ‘Shadow IT’.
40% of the organisations admitted that 10-20% of cloud services are being bought without IT’s permission, with 10-20 % of cloud applications implemented without IT involvement.
Centrify EMEA CTO Barry Scott said: "It probably seems like an easy solution for people looking to cut corners and avoid having to go through the formal process of getting IT approval.
"The problem is that so much cloud-based software is easily available and requires no IT skills whatsoever to manage, so staff are just downloading the tools they like or that will help in their work, without considering the risks."
Scott added: "While half of our poll respondents were confident that less than 10 per cent of applications were being implemented without their knowledge, they are likely to be underestimating the extent of shadow IT in their organisation.
"Without the necessary controls and security policies in place, including passwords and authentication, unauthorised cloud apps are opening up corporate data to the risk of compromise."
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