One in three lack plan for website going down

According to web-hosting business NetBenefit, almost three quarters (73%) of mid-sized UK companies were now doing business through their website. However, its research had shown that 33% of such companies did not have a disaster recovery plan in place for their site.

NetBenefit said that by failing to plan for internet related disasters, businesses were risking online revenue streams and brand reputations "worth millions of pounds".

The firm's chief executive, Jonathan Robinson, said: "We know that the number of mid-market companies now using the internet as a business channel continues to grow, but we have been very surprised by the lack of disaster recovery planning taking place.

"Nearly every day we hear about viruses, hacking and other web attacks, let alone natural disasters such as fires or floods. Yet, while many companies go to great lengths to protect their physical assets with burglar alarms and other security devices, they do little or nothing to protect their vital, online business."

Put to the test?

According to the research conducted by Vanson Bourne, out of those companies that did have plans in place to guard against threats such as viruses, DoS (Denial of Service) attacks or unpredicted spikes in traffic, only 38% tested their plans more than once a year.

The study also showed that many mid- sized companies were underestimating the effect of downtime with 64% of respondents anticipating no damage or only "slight" damage to their business if their website were to go down for a whole day.

Jonathan Robinson commented: "Research shows that more than one in four customers are likely to move to a competitor if a website is down for any reason. For many mid-sized companies this would not only damage customer-loyalty but also mean significant lost revenue."

He suggested that businesses used online services offering "dual site resilience" with "total mirroring" to ensure that back-up "was always available".

Aware, but unprepared

Recent research by web-security experts MessageLabs showed that the high impact threat of DoS attacks was a concern for just 18% of firms.

This was despite the fact that such attacks had the potential to bring online business operations and networks grinding to a halt by flooding systems with data requests.

This week MessageLabs said that although a growing number of small to medium sized firms were appreciating the range of online threats to their business, many were still not "proactive" enough when it came to IT security.

The company's chief security analyst, Mark Sunner, said: Although it appears SMEs now have a better understanding of the risks it still appears that many are unable to prioritise or dedicate the resources to deal with security appropriately.

"Without a comprehensive security solution many SMEs could be oblivious to the fact that they're being attacked, with the realisation only obvious once the damage has been done."