Corporate security worldwide is still at risk despite painful lessons learned from terrorism, the SARS epidemic and countless virus and hacker attacks, according to a business survey.
"Business leaders are more aware of security dangers, but need to do much more to prepare," research group Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) said after conducting a global poll.
The report found that very often the danger is within the company itself, with disgruntled or corrupt employees and lax controls over computer passwords compromising the security of information systems and valuable data.
In Asia, with SARS threatening a comeback, there is a new danger that companies will suffer again now that the crisis has passed and regional economies are on the upswing.
"Once the crisis was over, there was very little done to institutionalize learning and get ready for the next crisis," Hugh Bucknall, head of Mercer Human Resources Consulting in Asia, told the EIU.
"Companies need to look at a broader range of threats and have mechanisms to deal with them," he added.
Corporate security is heavily tilted towards information technology (IT) or protection of physical assets and personnel, following the 2001 terrorist attacks in the US and countless virus and hacker incidents.
But Goh Moh Heng, executive director of Disaster Recovery Institute Asia, said that "SARS created a new scenario that most planners would not have thought of: denial of access to people."
Uncertainty about how the SARS virus is transmitted forced companies to segregate employees. One bank even imported virus-proof medical "space suits" to enable IT employees to continue working even if infected by SARS.
Asian health officials fear that SARS might make a comeback during the traditional flu season in the winter months.
SARS infected more than 8,000 people and killed nearly 800, mostly in East Asia, after it appeared in southern China almost a year ago.
The crisi was estimated to have caused billions of dollars in economic damage.
Real estate agent and property developer JSL Construction & Development Co (愛山林) led the average compensation rankings among companies listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE) last year, while contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) finished 14th. JSL Construction paid its employees total average compensation of NT$4.78 million (US$159,701), down 13.5 percent from a year earlier, but still ahead of the most profitable listed tech giants, including TSMC, TWSE data showed. Last year, the average compensation (which includes salary, overtime, bonuses and allowances) paid by TSMC rose 21.6 percent to reach about NT$3.33 million, lifting its ranking by 10 notches
SEASONAL WEAKNESS: The combined revenue of the top 10 foundries fell 5.4%, but rush orders and China’s subsidies partially offset slowing demand Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) further solidified its dominance in the global wafer foundry business in the first quarter of this year, remaining far ahead of its closest rival, Samsung Electronics Co, TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said yesterday. TSMC posted US$25.52 billion in sales in the January-to-March period, down 5 percent from the previous quarter, but its market share rose from 67.1 percent the previous quarter to 67.6 percent, TrendForce said in a report. While smartphone-related wafer shipments declined in the first quarter due to seasonal factors, solid demand for artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing (HPC) devices and urgent TV-related orders
Prices of gasoline and diesel products at domestic fuel stations are this week to rise NT$0.2 and NT$0.3 per liter respectively, after international crude oil prices increased last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) said yesterday. International crude oil prices last week snapped a two-week losing streak as the geopolitical situation between Russia and Ukraine turned increasingly tense, CPC said in a statement. News that some oil production facilities in Alberta, Canada, were shut down due to wildfires and that US-Iran nuclear talks made no progress also helped push oil prices to a significant weekly gain, Formosa said
MINERAL DIPLOMACY: The Chinese commerce ministry said it approved applications for the export of rare earths in a move that could help ease US-China trade tensions Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng (何立峰) is today to meet a US delegation for talks in the UK, Beijing announced on Saturday amid a fragile truce in the trade dispute between the two powers. He is to visit the UK from yesterday to Friday at the invitation of the British government, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. He and US representatives are to cochair the first meeting of the US-China economic and trade consultation mechanism, it said. US President Donald Trump on Friday announced that a new round of trade talks with China would start in London beginning today,
RSS