'Manage your IT risk or lose your good name' Gartner

[InfoSec News <alerts () infosecnews org>]

http://www.computerworlduk.com/management/it-business/it-organisation/news/index.cfm?newsid=5221

By Leo King
Computerworld UK
September 18, 2007

Businesses must properly manage IT risks or face heavy damage to their 
strategic plans and their reputation, analysts have warned at Gartners 
IT Security Summit in London.

Many companies are failing to adjust their IT decision-making and risk 
management processes, Gartner said, despite the smooth running of IT 
becoming ever more integral to business success.

Gartner vice president Richard Hunter said: IT risk has changed. 
Incidents now harm constituencies within and outside companies. They 
damage corporate reputations and expose weaknesses in management teams.

Most importantly, uncontrolled IT risk dampens an organisations ability 
to compete.

Four strategic areas were identified by Gartner as most likely to be 
affected by poor risk management: the availability of IT systems and 
processes; control of access to IT systems; the accuracy of data pulled 
from IT systems; and the agility of IT systems to adapt quickly 
following company acquisitions or product launches.

Hunter said it would be impossible to eliminate IT risk but said that 
careful trade-offs between risk and return were needed.

But it should not be entirely up to IT departments to handle these 
risks, he added: IT risk must be understood in terms of its potential to 
affect all of the company objectives that are enabled by IT.


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