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Financial reports and other real-time operational data are often lagging indicators of performance. These metrics, although perhaps lacking precision, may have been sufficiently effective in the past; however, they are less so now because they lag the current cadence of information dissemination and business volatility today. The challenge for many...

For American companies who do business in Europe or who process the personal data of EU residents, the world of data privacy and security is about to get much more complicated. While U.S. privacy law is unsettled, with rapidly proliferating state and federal laws and regulations and uncertainty as to how strictly they will be enforced, the rules in...

Vulnerability assessments and penetration testing may uncover areas where hackers can break in, but what if they are already there? Cyber Hunting is a proactive strategy to identify if anyone is already on your network versus waiting for an actual breach to occur. Most breaches occur weeks or even months after the attacker gets a foothold on the ne...

Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policies are becoming more and more popular, and with good reason. As the capabilities of tablets and smartphones continue to rapidly expand, the mobility revolution has been a boon for businesses and employees alike, enabling greater productivity and more flexibility. BYOD amplifies those efficiency gains, reducing adm...

In the last few years, hackers and cyber criminals have become much more sophisticated in how they steal private information, which has led to massive data breaches. These data breaches not only cost an organization hundreds of thousands of dollars in fixes and possible fines, they can ruin a long-established reputation in a matter of hours. Puttin...

Flash drives and laptops may pose a threat to company security as employees take confidential information outside the office, according to a survey from Tower Software. The U.K.-based company found that 55 percent of surveyed employees store work-related e-mails, files and documents in locations other than a secure, shared computer network.

Staff recruitment, hiring and retention are challenging and diffi cult processes for any employer. When this task is assumed by a family, many of the standard issues raised are magnifi ed because of the family's limited experience in this job capacity. When you take on the role of employer, risk management changes in many ways. Despite the conc...

Two notices from Withers Worldwide discuss changes to U.S. tax rules in the deferred remuneration area that take effect on 1 January 2009. These rules (found in Sections 409A and 457A of the U.S. tax code) target deferred payments that do not satisfy complex technical requirements, imposing a compliance burden on non-U.S. as well as U.S. employers....

A limited liability company may seem like the best way to structure private aircraft ownership, organizing finances while shielding other assets from liability, but think again, says Gary Horowitz of Wiley Rein. Using an LLC can lead to a huge tax liability, potential fines by the Federal Aviation Administration and increased personal liability. Th...

At a time when some businesses are struggling simply to stay afloat, warnings over the dangers of inappropriate usage of business e-mail might seem misplaced. However, this remains a risk that can often be poorly managed and that could cause disproportionate damage to an already fragile corporate.

In order to increase the bottom line of a family office, one of the key econometrics is understanding the relationship between the fee charged and the costs associated with each client. Understanding the fees charged to a client is usually well known based on invoices sent to the client. However, without a corresponding knowledge of the costs per c...

Although the recent focus has been on public companies and the new requirement to obtain an independent opinion on internal control over financial reporting, this requirement has also brought to the forefront the importance of internal controls at nonpublic entities. Although not less important, internal controls for small companies and family off...

Wealth management firms and banks must transform their client reporting systems to satisfy investment and web-savvy clients. That's according to a report on next-generation wealth management from Actuate Corp. and IBM Corp. The report examines the growth of the market and outlines some of the challenges confronting wealth managers.

China has become a prime source of malicious computer activity, according to Finjan, a California-based provider of Web security solutions. In its December monthly report, Finjan shows the network of connections between Chinese-based servers and how hackers use it to launch spyware attacks from legitimate, even government, Web sites in Western coun...

Online criminals are working through legitimate sites to place spyware or other malicious programs on the computers of ordinary users, according to Trends in Badware 2007, a report by StopBadware. Criminals can access users' private information through links and software placed on these sites. The report outlines current practices, lists compromise...