On December 7 we will release our MessageLabs Intelligence 2010 Annual Security Report looking back at the changes in the threat landscape during 2010. We also use the opportunity to look ahead at potential trends for next year. In the days leading up to the publication of the report we will share a few of these trends.

Distributed Workforce Drives Security Policies

The past year has challenged businesses with securing an increasingly distributed workforce in the wake of the recent global economic crisis. With laptops and smart-phones becoming ubiquitous the workforce is increasingly distributed regardless of where workers spend their traditional work day. To remain competitive, as the economy begins to recover, companies will continue to look to employee productivity gains from longer hours, working remotely and from home offices. IDC estimates that 1 billion workers will be mobile at least part of the time or remote from their firm’s main location by the end of 2011. These workers will be accessing business applications and services across a number of different devices.

In 2011, businesses will become more aware of the issues associated with managing remote workers and recognize the need to apply consistent policy controls and safeguard Internet access from malware such as that from unsecured USB storage devices, and drive-by attacks on compromised websites.

Tomorrow: Making Web Security Work in an Era of Pervasive Threats and Security and Services Continue to Migrate to the Cloud

Published earlier:
23Nov: Global Spam - http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/2011-trends-global-spam