Is this year turning out to be even worse for getting hacked than last year?

That’s what a survey of 50 IT and network professionals would indicate, with large companies in particular reporting this to be worse than last in terms of suffering at least one network intrusion of their user machines, office network or servers.

The SAS 70 replacementAccording to the Sixth Annual Enterprise IT Security Survey released Monday, 67% of large companies with 5,000 or more employees reported one successful intrusion or more this year, as opposed to % in 2009. Mid-size companies of ,000 to ,999 employees fared better with 9% reporting an intrusion, up slightly from 7% in 2009.

For the first time, the survey, sponsored by VanDyke Software and undertaken by Amplitude Research in mid-September, delved into what the survey respondents believed primarily caused the network intrusion.

Fourteen percent of those surveyed attributed their intrusion problem to “hacker/network attack,” 2% cited “lack of adequate security policies/measures,” 0% said “employee Web usage,” 9% pointed to “virus/malware/spyware,” 8% faulted other employee carelessness, negligence,” 6% said “unauthorized access by current/former employees,” % blamed “weak passwords,” % thought it was because of “lack of software updates,” and % simply said “software security flaw/bug.”

More than a quarter of the 200 respondents say their employer outsources technology jobs to an offshore location, roughly the same percentage as in 009. About half of those reporting this kind of outsourcing said they felt it had a negative impact on their own organization’s network security. However, nearly a third felt it had “no impact,” and about one-fifth called it a “positive impact.’

About half of respondents said their organizations have a formal security audit by an outside organization at least once a year, up from % in 009. Some 6% felt the audits helped identity “significant security problems.”

Separately, 6% this year reported undergoing an internal security audit at least once a year, down slightly from 67% in 009. Forty-seven percent felt internal audits helped identify security problems, but 0% said the audit didn’t go far enough and 0% felt the audits should occur more frequently.

Read more about wide area network in Network World’s Wide Area Network section.

As SaaS (software as a service) gains in maturity and popularity, enterprise IT buyers will have to grapple with a new set of questions and considerations when purchasing it, according to a new Forrester Research report.

The report by analyst Liz Herbert identifies five key areas of change for SaaS: Industry specialization, embedded analytics, orchestration of multiple services, social networking and mobility.

“Some industry solutions will go beyond encapsulated best practices and code templates to include bundles of applications, either in a preconfigured, ready-to-go solution or in a cloud orchestration or marketplace model for a specific industry,” Herbert wrote. But the catch for buyers will be higher costs, sometimes significantly so, she added. “For example, some microvertical solutions built on NetSuite sell for four times the cost of NetSuite.”

Analytics have become intrinsic to SaaS offerings and are being delivered “in context with tasks [users] are working on,” Herbert wrote. “For many organizations, the most valuable analytics will include industry- specific benchmarking data to compare themselves against, which some SaaS providers are starting to provide.”

However, for the most part, SaaS applications focus on reports and not “true” or more advanced forms of analytics, meaning that customers may still have to investigate specialized tools, she added.

Meanwhile, customers who want to run a series of SaaS applications will have more choices regarding how to manage them, Herbert predicted.

“Faced with the proliferation of SaaS applications and smaller, often riskier vendors, some firms want a simpler solution that will provide a single point of responsibility for contracting, billing, provisioning, support, integration, upgrades, and testing,” she wrote. Right now, vendors such as Hewlett-Packard are offering such services but for the most part they are “one-off, ad hoc arrangements.” However, buyers can expect this model to mature, she added.

The orchestration trend will grow along with the rise in enterprise application Web stores, which allow customers to easily buy add-ons for their SaaS applications, Herbert wrote. But both channels carry elements of risk, such as vendor lock-in, she added.

SaaS buyers also need to ensure their providers have a strong social media strategy and capabilities, according to Herbert. “Leading firms recruit through channels such as Facebook and Second Life and talk to customers through Twitter and Facebook,” she wrote. “Sourcing executives must look for solutions that can integrate social information into traditional sources of information, including analytics that can take a 60-degree view of employees, customers, and products.”

Finally, customers should take care to understand how SaaS vendors currently or plan to support mobile deployments, according to Herbert.

“Mobile is still a newer trend for most SaaS solutions. Cool and innovative features may not have much value if your workforce has older devices,” she wrote. But over the 0 years, falling prices, advancements in battery life and high-speed coverage as well as other factors “will drive mobility to the forefront,” she added.

Ate too much turkey? Maybe a handful of tablets will make you feel better. Acer has at least four waiting in the wings for spring, and Rupert Murdoch is cooking up some tabloid content to put on those tabs. In other news: A Colorado company has a solution for travelers unnerved by those “naked” airport scanners, researchers at CERN have discovered antimatter that really matters, and — yes — there may be yet another Facebook movie coming out. Have you recovered enough from your gorge fest to take our quiz? Give yourself 0 points for each correct answer. Now loosen your belt and begin.

. Just as nature abhors a vacuum, the Web abhors going more than two weeks without a juicy Apple rumor. What’s cooking this week?

a. The Beatles are coming to iTunesb. Apple is dropping Mac OS X and going strictly iOSc. Apple will introduce a “World iPad” yeard. Steve Jobs is stepping down as CEO

2. But wait, there’s more. Apple and News Corp. are apparently teaming up to create the first “newspaper” designed specifically for — and appearing only on — Web tablets. What will it called?

a. The Daily

b. The Daily Show

c. The Daily Snow

d. The iPaper

. That Murdoch tablet-tabloid may end up on more than just Apple’s iPad, if Acer has a say. The Taiwanese hardware giant just previewed three new tablets and a -inch dual touchscreen “concept” laptop. What is the last one called?

a. Antonia

b. Iconia

c. Euphonia

d. Balonia

. One Facebook movie was apparently not enough. An animated film that promises to show a more sordid side of Facebook’s founder may be in the works. Which of the following is not one of the proposed plot points of “Mark Zuckerberg and the Found”?

a. Zuck dating Victoria’s Secret supermodels

b. Zuck being held up at a gas station

c. Zuck holding up a gas station

d. uck eating a koala on a yacht

. Nissan is planning to debut a new electric car in the United States month. What’s it called?

a. Twig

b. Leaf

c. Branch

d. Root

6. “I hate to do this Internet, I really really do, but let me lay out some level headed reality. The _____ profile and in game content you create is accessible by everyone. You do not have the context inside of it to explain your long winded contrarian view that your pithy text that violates the Terms of Use or Code of Conduct is actually intended to change people’s minds about a commonly held understanding. It’s not political correctness, it’s fundamental respect.” What is blogger Stephen Toulouse talking about?

a. Swastika logos inside Xbox Live

b. Burning crosses inside Farmville

c. A Muslim crescent inside Call of Duty

d. Racist graffiti inside Grand Theft Auto

7. A Colorado company has introduced a way to thwart those privacy-shredding “naked scanners” at airport security. What is it?

a. Lead-lined boxers

b. A tungsten fig leaf

c. Aluminum pants

d. Socking the TSA agent in the jaw

8. Proving that old platform game heroes never die (well, not more than 6,78,26 times), Nintendo has revived yet another famous 2-D character for the Wii. Who’s back and badder than ever this holiday season?

a. Sonic T. Hedgehog

b. Diddy Kong

c. Princess Zelda

d. Ms. Pac Man