Employees using company computers to download MP3 music files are costing Australian firms at least Aus$60-million a year.
Melbourne-based network management company Exinda Networks went through Australian Bureau of Statistics data and the files of an internet service provider to come up with a picture of the cost of bandwidth stealing in the workaday world.
Exinda said local businesses were spending Aus$450-million a year on accessing the internet. Of that, Aus$58-million was paid out for illicit usage — the equivalent of one million MP3 files each day.
Exinda director Con Nikolouzakis said pirate downloading gobbles up capacity on computer networks.
”Beware of the employee who comes to work with an MP3 player,” he told Australia’s AAP news agency. ”They can store up to 40 gigabytes of music, movies and programs and kill your network performance.”
Nikolouzakis estimated that installing network-monitoring equipment could save businesses millions in internet costs. By allocating individual users a specific amount of resources on a computer network, companies could stop frivolous use. — Sapa-DPA