Friday, April 24, 2009

Lost Laptop Cost Survey

A single lost or stolen laptop costs a business an average of nearly $50,000. At least, that's the word from an Intel-sponsored study by the Ponemon Institute.

That figure is based on Ponemon's recent voluntary survey of 28 US companies reporting 138 separate cases of missing laptops.

Value of missing kit was mathmagically calculated by factoring laptop replacement, data breach cost, loss of productivity, investigation cost, and other variables.

The value of a lost lappy to a firm cost an average of $49,246, according to Ponemon. Minimum damage calculated in the survey was about $1,200, and the maximum reported value was just short of a cool $1m.

By far, the cost of a data breach was found to be the most expensive part of losing a lappy, eating up about 80 per cent of the total average cost to a company. (more) (survey)