Named earlier this month as one of San Diego’s fastest-growing technology companies, Websense has been publishing studies on Internet usage for years, using the data to aid in the development of software that can be custom-tailored to filter Internet content at work and allow businesses to monitor, analyze, and control how their workers use the web.
The company’s studies have also found that 30 percent of peer-to-peer requests at work are for pornographic downloads, and that 12 percent of employees admit to having visited a pornographic website at work, either by accident or on purpose.
Websense’s competitors have found similar numbers in separate studies. According to a survey last year conducted by Queen's University for porn-filtering firm SurfControl, one-third of workers intentionally viewed porn at some time while at work. Of that portion, 36 percent worked at companies with 500 employees or more, while 27 percent worked for companies with 20 or fewer employees.
The survey also reported that half of all employees had been exposed to sexually explicit material by co-workers.