A study by the A. James Clark School of Engineering at the University of Maryland found that an Internet connected PC will be attacked at a "near-constant rate" -- every 39 seconds on average.

The study, conducted by Michel Cukier, Clark School assistant professor of mechanical engineering and affiliate of the Clark School's Center for Risk and Reliability and Institute for Systems Research, profiled the behavior of "brute force" hackers, who use simple software-aided techniques to randomly attack large numbers of computers. The researchers discovered which usernames and passwords are tried most often, and what hackers do when they gain access to a computer.

"Our data provide quantifiable evidence that attacks are happening all the time to computers with Internet connections," Cukier notes.  "The computers in our study were attacked, on average, 2,244 times a day."

Without a reliable network infrastructure, your business is at risk

The potential risk to your business comes in many forms:

• Theft of sensitive company information - client lists, competitive data, trade secrets
• Theft of bank account or credit card information
• Theft of network bandwidth and misuse of your company assets
• Destruction of data
• Productivity loss
• Damage to reputation