SAN JOSE – Finjan, which provides secure web gateway solutions, recently conducted an online survey of 200 IT and security professionals that revealed that while the total IT budgets for 2009 are likely to be reduced compared to 2008, the IT security budget outlook was more optimistic as organizations intend to dedicate a larger part of their total IT budgets to IT security.

As the amount of cybercrime attacks increased in 2008, the survey noted that 34 percent of the respondents indicated that their IT security budgets for 2009 will increase, indicating a general trend that organizations will allocate a larger part of their overall IT budget to IT security. 43 percent of all respondents expect their IT security budget for 2009 to remain the same.

“Security is something that enables business and not something that is nice to have such as a new reporting system or an updated CRM application,” said Yuval Ben-Itzhak, chief technology officer at Finjan. “Security is needed to secure your business even when the market is suffering from economy issues.”

Other findings include 38 percent of all respondents stated that they do not expect a change in their 2009 IT budgets, while 34 percent indicated that they expect them to be slightly smaller -reflecting the general declining trend in corporate budgets.

Ben-Itzhak explained that the decrease in IT budgets focused on cost savings with many organizations avoiding nice-to-have and best of breed solutions. Instead, their budgets highlighted solutions that were needed to help the business achieve their goals.

“During an economic downturn it is to be expected that all budgets come under scrutiny. Organizations are trying to get the most out of their spending and reduce the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) of their IT investments,” he stated. “While 2008 saw IT security departments facing new challenges in protecting valuable business data against an ever-increasing wave of cybercrime attacks, 2009 is adding a further economic challenge to the mix. As a result, organizations are looking for a comprehensive security solution with low TCO that covers all their Web security needs and is also simple and easy to manage.”

The survey also found that the upward trend in IT security budget allocation was more pronounced in the financial and governmental sectors than in others as these verticals had regulations that they needed to comply with.

Ben-Itzhak added that he hopes people will look at how they manage their own budgets and not be overly optimistic or pessimistic or they could make a mistake in their IT security spending, which then could make them vulnerable to attacks.

This column was written by Vanessa Ho of ConnectIT, an IntegratedMarCompany

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