It's 11:32 on a Tuesday morning: Do you know where your data is?

IT organizations have learned the hard way that leakage of confidential information, whether it trickled out inadvertently or passed through in a calculated fashion, can levy heavy damages against market share and brand reputation, and potentially give rise to civil lawsuits and punitive fines.

The danger of data leakage is clear and present. Research conducted by InfoPro says 72% of enterprises surveyed report that internal security threats pose an equal or greater problem than external risks. An ability to prevent disclosures, or at least manage them, is critical to complying with industry and governmental regulations and guarding brand reputation.

IT executives must take a more proactive approach to monitoring and securing all data in motion. Not only e-mail but all forms of electronic communications must be monitored - instant messages, peer-to-peer, Telnet, FTP traffic, automatic faxes, posting to discussion boards and online business transactions.

Enter a slew of new and reconditioned products geared toward blocking sensitive data from leaving the corporate network. Vendors in this market include Fidelis Security Systems, Intrusion, Palisade Systems, PortAuthority Technology, Proofpoint, Reconnex, Tablus, Vericept and Vontu (see Excel product chart).

These vendors have developed network-based products that can monitor data in motion and in some cases, data at rest. This lets an organization identify data-flow patterns, such as a human resources department distributing unsecured employee information via e-mail. Policy-violation alerts can be sent to administrators, the sender and/or the user.