Jon Oltsik, a security analyst with Enterprise Strategy Group in Milford, Mass., said the Ponemon figures mirror statistics that have been collected by his company.

"The 41 percent who say they don't have the resources [to effectively fight the problem] -- that I completely believe," Oltsik said. "A lot of companies are kind of slow" in dealing with such problems, he added.

Oltsik said his data shows that the biggest risk for data breaches is the use of laptop computers, which can be easily lost or stolen.

Monitoring a company's data use policies is important, he said, but that's difficult to do because of employee training needs, turnover and other issues. "No one does that kind of stuff," he said.