In last week's IDC telebriefing, IDC analyst Stephen Minton suggested that the number of bytes of data generated by computers and other personal electronic devices will rival the number of grains of sand on all of the world's beaches. It may be a vivid image, but the overall point of the briefing was that a large percentage of the data being generated will cross the corporate network.

Some firms are on top of data collection and Minton suggested that companies may gain a competitive advantage if they can find a way to make sense of the data they generate or come in contact with each day. Alongside the volume of data, the security of the data poses a problem for most corporations, which are ill-prepared to deal with the onslaught.

Corporations that want to enter the world of data mining must also come prepared with a rigorous, universal security policy that applies to everyone and everything on the corporate network. At Gartner's IT Security Summit in London, analyst Les Stevens suggested that corporations have been inattentive to their security needs and the development of successful policies in favor of pleasing management and meeting audit requirements.

Stevens suggests that comprehensive top-down security policies, combined with stringent security audits, are needed in order to meet the security requirements of most organizations.