An independent survey for Wire of over 200 IT, security, and compliance leaders across the UK, Germany, and France has found that UK organizations report the highest level of shadow IT use. Among UK respondents, 44% said that parts of their collaboration workflows take place outside of approved tools and governance frameworks.
The findings also highlight a wider disconnection issue across the three countries surveyed. While 84% of organizations rate their collaboration environment as secure and 79% are confident they can control how collaboration data is accessed and shared, almost half (48%) say sensitive information is sometimes or often shared through tools not designed for secure communication. Only 29% believe their current collaboration tools are fully suitable for sensitive communications. The findings suggest the challenge is not simply one of security controls, but of aligning practices with how people work.
Of the surveyed organizations, 75% rely on email as their primary method of external collaboration, 42% use consumer messaging apps such as WhatsApp or Signal for work, and only 28% use dedicated secure collaboration tools when working with external parties.
