Behind the Headlines: Media blamed for over-hyping e-security

The media has come under attack from ecommerce experts for sensationalising recent online security blunders.

Guests on this week's Behind the Headlines programme complained that coverage by the media was in danger of presenting online consumers with a distorted view of the dangers of ecommerce.

René Carayol, chairman of e-photomail.com, said that security breaches only affected a minority of organisations, but the media construed it to be an industry-wide issue.

Referring to recent coverage of security breaches, Carayol said: "Consumer confidence has suffered and if we continue to fan the flames it will continue to suffer. The incidence of occurrence is quite small. Ninety per cent of organisations have their act together. The industry does not have an issue. It's just some organisations within the industry that do, and we don't want to blow it out of perspective."

Stuart Curley, senior consultant at Cap Gemini Ernst Young, agreed that the media has hyped the issue out of proportion.

"I'd put the figure higher than that. I'd say about 99.8 per cent of organisations have addressed the issue. Most banks have secure sites. Let's put the story in perspective. Most security invasions are actually in house by people who have access to private data and misuse it."

Silicon.com's recently-launched campaign, called Back the Act, does recognise that the vast majority of companies get ecommerce right - but the one per cent who do not are tarnishing the reputation of the whole industry.

Geoff Petherick, CEO of industry user association UKCMG, claimed that while some high profile cases like Powergen deserved to be publicised, e-security was subject to unduly harsh criticism.

"All companies suffer security breaches, it's a fact of life. You're better protected in ecommerce than for example handing over a credit card in a restaurant. Some cases deserved to be highlighted but it's not a big issue," Petherick insisted.

Panelists also discussed the implications of application service providers (ASPs) on inhouse IT departments and the £2bn DSS contract won by EDS.

You can see the entire Behind the Headlines programme in our Outsourcing Channel (http://www.silicon.com/a39168 )