"It is most definitely an issue for business and it is a long way from being fixed."

Turner said the top factors in order of importance for security offerings are quality, timeliness of support/updates, followed by cost.

He said spam is also seen as a problematic area due to the obligation of some organizations to retain e-mail for compliance reasons.

"A complete revision of e-mail architecture is required to help restore faith in an area of communication that could be so much better than it is," Turner added.

It is these issues that have led to a growing interest in managed security services.