From: eWeek

By Robert Lemos

The vast majority of businesses use publicly released threat reports to create their security strategy and need better data, according to a survey by one security firm.

Looking to design their security strategies for the coming year, companies overwhelmingly make use of the annual threat reports compiled by security and Internet-service firms, research has found.

Nearly seven out of every eight companies use the global threat reports created by firms such as McAfee, Microsoft, Symantec and Verizonto guide their security strategies, according to a survey, conducted by security-services firm Solutionary.

Almost 80 percent of the security professionals that responded to the survey use annual threat data to support their requests for budget increasesas well.

By creating reports that are more useful for their customers, security software makers and service providers can help themselves by aiding their customers’ security teams successfully argue for budget hikes, said Rob Kraus, director of research for the Solutionary Engineering Research Team (SERT).

“Through the history of security, we have always had that challenge of how do I justify this; how do I get the money; how do we tell our bosses that it is important; how do I let our C-level executives know that we need to do this to address a lot of threats out there that could cost us a lot of money,” he said. “Organizations are still having difficulty overcoming and obtaining budget.”

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