Check out this fascinating new piece that discusses patterns in the way companies discover the need for security products. Here are some excerpts, taken from the opening keynote speech at Gartner's IT Security Summit in Sydney.

Analyst group Gartner claims that almost three quarters of American companies feel safer than they were a year ago but only 22 percent of Australian firms feel the same way.

... Gartner's research has indicated that companies generally fall into a number of phases (outlined below) when it comes to spending on security. ...

• Blissfully Ignorant: where they spend less than three percent of their IT budget on security and, according to Gartner, will most likely face serious issues in the future.
• Awareness/Corrective phase: where companies have had a rude awakening from their ignorance and are now trying to get their systems up to date. This process takes around three years and requires a company to spend between four and eight percent of its IT budget on security.
• Operational Excellence: where companies have internal procedures in place to deal with existing security issues and are prepared to fight any new threats quickly and efficiently. These companies spend between three and four percent of their IT budget on security.

Mogull said companies should stop asking for a return on investment for certain security products and instead see them as a "cost of doing business".

"What is the return on investment of buying a firewall or antivirus? It's like asking 'what is the return of investment on a fire extinguisher?' What is the return on investment on getting your employees desks?

"For some it really is just the cost of doing business. If you don't have antivirus, if you don't have firewalls then you are not going to be able to do anything else -- unless you do it all on paper," he added.

Read the entire article in ZDNet >

If you're in the Awareness/Corrective phase, take a good hard look at GWAVA today.

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