The banking industry is increasingly becoming a favourite among cyber criminals, according to security vendor MailGuard, which has detected a new phishing email scam purporting to be from Westpac.

Global IT security spending ranges from approximately 1% to 13% of the IT budget, with the average spend  standing at 5.6%, but research analyst firm Gartner says the figures are potentially a misleading indicator of programme success.

IT security management is a growing business in Australia and around the world, and fears about data theft and cyber-attacks has driven up demand for IT security experts and, in turn, lifted salaries organisations need to pay to get the benefits of their expertise.