Hong Kong NGOs (non-governmental organizations) generally lack security awareness and knowledge of cloud solutions, according to a survey.
Co-sponsored by Microsoft and Hong Kong Council of Social Service, the survey was independently conducted by the Public Opinion Programme at the University of Hong Kong (HKUPOP) on 93 IT and non-IT specialists from local NGOs in April. The survey was aimed at understanding the current applications of network security in local NGOs, their views and concerns about cloud solutions.
The survey said close to 50% of surveyed NGOs revealed the lack of comprehensive security protection which included all five core protective measures for servers and applications: anti-virus, regular backup, firewall, physical security and uninterruptable power supply. Of all 93 respondents, 94% have implemented anti-virus and regular backup, and 87% have firewall in place.
On a scale of 0-10, NGOs rated themselves at 6.7 for the sufficiency of security regarding data storage and transfer within their organizations. As for the need to enhance current security work and/or facilities in data storage and transfer, the average rating was 5.8, implying a comparatively low awareness and sense of urgency toward a need upgrade their security systems, the survey said.
To ensure no data leakage when transferring important or confidential data, 76% of NGOs used "postal or manual delivery". This was followed by 62% which set a password in a file, then transfer by email. Only 20% of the respondents used email built-in security system to transfer data.
About 74% of the respondents said they did not allow employees to take confidential data such as users' personal data, away from the office by USB or other hardware. As for NGOs that allowed employees to take away confidential data, "encryption" (38%) was the most common security measure adopted, followed by "employees' self-discipline" (13%).
The survey further said about one-third had deployed cloud solutions at present. Among NGOs that were using cloud solutions, email (24%) and "file storage/sharing" (17%) were the most common cloud applications. Only 5% maintained member/volunteer databases on the cloud, and just 1% of the respondents maintained their database on the cloud.