CompTIA: Security spending to consume more of the IT budget pie
Spending on security technology, training, assessments and certification, which accounted for a fifth of IT budgets last year, will eat up an increasingly large part of IT spending in the next year, according to a survey from the Computing Technology Industry Association (CompTIA).According to the survey of 1,070 organizations, respondents spent 20 percent of their total technology budgets in 2006 on security-related expenses, up from 15 percent in 2005 and 12 percent in 2004.
The survey also revealed that nearly half of IT professionals intend to increase spending on security-related technologies, and a third want to increase spending on security training.
For every dollar spent on security, 42 cents goes toward product purchases, 17 cents for security-related processes, 15 cents for training, 12 cents for assessments, and 9 cents for certification. The most common product purchases are anti-virus software, firewalls and proxy servers, according to CompTIA.
The CompTIA survey reinforces the findings of a similar report issued earlier this year. According to a study by consultancy TheInfoPro Inc., more than 70 percent of Fortune 1,000 companies said they plan to increase their security budgets, mostly to meet regulatory and audit requirements.
Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standards were the primary compliance driver for increased security spending, according to TheInfoPro's survey.
