U.S. companies are increasingly concerned about a growing number of data leaks caused by employee’s misuse of email, blogs, social networks and text messages, according to a new survey from Proofpoint.

Forty-three percent of U.S. companies surveyed had investigated an email-based leak of confidential information in the past year. Nearly a third of them, 31 percent, fired an employee for violation email policies in the same period.

Eighteen percent had investigated a data loss event via a blog or message board in the past 12 months. Seventeen percent disciplined an employee for violating blog or message board policies, while nearly nine percent fired an employee for such a violation.

Social networks are also creating problems for companies with 17 percent reporting some type of privacy breach and eight percent firing an employee for such an action.

As the global economic recession forced many US companies to downsize and reduce spending, the results of Proofpoint‘s survey show that those actions have often put them at greater risk for several reasons:

• 18 percent of US companies investigated a suspected leak or theft of confidential or proprietary information associated with an employee leaving the company (e.g., through voluntary or involuntary termination) in the past 12 months.
• 42 percent of respondents say that increasing numbers of layoffs at their organizations in the past 12 months have created an increased risk of data leakage. 47 percent of respondents report that layoffs of IT staff have negatively impacted their organization’s ability to protect confidential, proprietary and sensitive information in the past 12 months.
• 50 percent of respondents say that budget constraints have negatively impacted their organization’s ability to protect confidential, proprietary or sensitive information in the past 12 months.