In the Philippines, IBM's local Technology Services unit handles customer engagements.

Praveen noted that Asian companies have become more open to risk assessments, such as 'ethical hacking', performed by an outside team of security experts. 'But companies in most countries are not yet into managed security services,' he said, citing factors like labor costs and market maturity.

In terms of security spending, he added that most organizations in the region are still heavily focused on data privacy rather than compliance with industry regulations such as Basel 2 for banks and financial institutions.