Here are some of the findings of the 8th Annual 2010 BSI Computer Theft Survey:
° There were over 5,500,000 computers stolen in the USA in the last three years. Worldwide statistics are proportionally similar.
° According to the FBI, only 3% of unprotected (those that do not use a software tracking and recovery software) stolen computers are ever recovered.
° More than half (58.7%) of the survey respondents have been the victim of computer theft in the last 12 months.
° Sixty-seven percent of computer theft occurred while respondent was mobile (moving about), rendering cables, locks and enclosures virtually useless.
° Over three quarters (78.2%) of respondent companies had between one and nine computers stolen in the last 12 months; more than one in 10 (17.6%) respondent companies had more than 25 computers stolen in the last 12 months.
° Laptops comprised more than two thirds (68%) of those devices reported stolen, followed by desktop computers (10%) and PDAs, iPods, iPhones, etc. (22%).
° Ninety-seven percent of survey respondents that experienced computer theft report the thief was never caught.
° Forty-six percent of respondents report the estimated value of proprietary data on their stolen computing device at $25,000 or less; 46.5 % estimated the value at between @25,000 and $1,000,000. ; 6.5% estimated the value at $1,000.000 or more and 1% estimated the value at more than $10,000,000.
° Approximately 59.% of respondents report other items were stolen at the time of the computer theft, with removable media (including spare disks, stored files on CDs, removable media and spare hard drives) accounting for 36.5 % of the additional stolen items.
° About 21% of respondents use only a log-on password to protect their computer; 29% recorded and stored the make, model and serial number of the computer in case of theft; and almost three quarters (70%) used no security precautions to safeguard their computing device from theft.
° Forty-four percent of all respondents report they only back-up data weekly, monthly, rarely or never.
° Ninety-one percent of respondents did not encrypt the proprietary data on their stolen computing device.
° About 53.4% of respondents that experienced computer theft had multiple incidences of theft in the last 12 months.
° More than two-thirds (68.9%) of computer thefts occurred outside traditional business hours.
° Average total replacement cost of stolen computing devices was $43,264.66 per device.
° Seventy-one percent of respondents reported downtime due to computer theft ranging from several days to more than one month.