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InformationWeek is conducting its annual survey on IT spending priorities. The results will appear in an upcoming issue of InformationWeek as well as in an in-depth report. This survey will take about 10 minutes to complete. Upon completion, you will be eligible to enter a drawing to receive one Apple 32GB iPad mini valued at $429 from UBM Tech. This survey sweepstakes is not sponsored, endorsed or administered by Apple. Your responses will remain confidential and will only be reported in aggregate.

Mobile-enabled sales and service tools are improving workforce metrics across industries. Here are seven case studies to show how mobility can transform financial services firms in retail and business banking, capital markets, insurance and wealth management.

The market for IT talent in the sector is strengthening and shifting in focus, with data analysis skills in high demand. However, total compensation for IT staff and managers has been relatively flat.

In today's enterprise, the endpoint could be any number of devices operating in any number of locations. With endpoint technology changing so rapidly, what's the best approach to building an effective, enforceable endpoint security strategy that works across the enterprise? In this Dark Reading report, we examine the challenges of endpoint security and recommend the steps organizations should take toward developing a security strategy that is both effective and practical.

Is your glass house a sparkling hub of IT innovation or a financial albatross? For many, it's the latter. Worse, we often lack agility, 67% say application and hardware philosophies frequently or occasionally conflict business demand, and just 27% say a private cloud is a high priority. Meanwhile, planned use of colocation facilities is up an anemic 5 points over last year.

The value of threat intelligence is based on organization-specific factors, including how threat intelligence is defined, the data the organization evaluates, the maturity of the shop in question and the use cases for the data. In this Dark Reading report, we examine how a combination of threat intelligence and security monitoring can boost enterprise defenses, and recommend how to determine if your organization is ready to tap into the model.

Our 1,029 respondents are getting wise on awareness, with just 13% saying they're more vulnerable than last year. Still, 73% see mobility as a threat, and 75% admit they may be ignorant of a breach.

Database administrators are the caretakers of an organization's most precious asset -- its data -- but rarely do they have the experience and skills required to secure that data. Indeed, the goals of DBAs and security pros are often at odds. That gap must be bridged in order for organizations to effectively protect data in an increasingly complex and threat-ridden environment. In this Dark Reading report, we examine what DBAs should know about security, as well as recommend how database and security pros can work more effectively together.

Almost half, 47%, of our 450 respondents consider the company a serious threat in the networking market, with just 34% calling the government ban on carriers buying Huawei equipment for U.S. networks a deal breaker. What's your stance?

A DCI lets companies link two or more data centers together for disaster recovery or business continuity, but it's not easy. This report provides an overview of the major DCI technologies and describes their pros and cons.

Salaries are basically flat for managers and staff in network and data center positions, according to InformationWeek's 2013 U.S. IT Salary Survey. Base salaries rose by a median of less than 2% for staff and management vs. 2012. In other words, the weak economic recovery is reflected in paychecks for IT pros.

Salaries are up slightly -- 1.6% for staff and 2.4% for managers -- while job security appears strong and satisfaction levels are high, with 66% of staff and 73% of managers saying they’re satisfied or very satisfied with their jobs.

Salaries for IT pros in higher education have been stuck in neutral for some time, rising just 1.4% for managers and remaining flat for staff this year. But workers get satisfaction from job perks such as flexibility and time off.

We outline six questions you must ask when deciding whether to move your telephony system to a hosted VoIP provider, including questions about reliability, branch survivability, E911 capability and whether you're looking for additional collaboration services. We also outline how to price a hosted VoIP option.

Eventually, the vast majority of Web applications will run on a platform-as-a-service, or PaaS, vendor's infrastructure. The shift will be gradual -- significantly slower than the move to infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) providers like Amazon Web Services -- for several reasons.

The cloud promises -- and often delivers -- tremendous cost savings and agility for enterprises. However, whether a company is leveraging the public cloud, a private cloud or some combination thereof, the security equation changes significantly when the cloud is a factor. In this Dark Reading report, we examine the security implications of cloud computing and offer advice for plugging any holes in the model.

In the increasingly complex world of information security, it's important for security professionals to be able to understand not only how their organization's systems and data may be compromised but why. In this Dark Reading report we examine why certain vulnerabilities are exploited, by whom and with what. We also provide recommendations for getting out in front of hackers by using some of the same tools and strategies they do.

Assessing and reporting risk is a challenge in any case, but especially in today's constantly changing IT and business environments. Organizations that want to approach risk in a systematic way face significant obstacles, but it is possible to adopt a structured risk management strategy while keeping data current. In this Dark Reading report, we recommend strategies and tools for harnessing data in a way that's relevant and meaningful, and can be effectively reported to all stakeholders.

IBM has long touted big iron as the platform of choice for massive transactions, batch processing and critical financial services, and with good reason. But can the mainframe hold its ground in the face of cloud, distributed computing and relentless budget pressure? Yes, if IT can leverage killer apps and hold the line on costs.

It's a mobile world, and Wi-Fi is displacing wired Ethernet: 89% use 802.11 as a client network access method, up from 76% in 2010. Still, IT must meet high expectations for network speed, security and reliability. Perhaps that's why a surprising 45% have plans to deploy 802.11ac gear in production.

Knotted and complex database access permissions are among the biggest threats to enterprise data security. In this Dark Reading report, we examine the problems associated with granting permissions to sensitive data, and recommend solutions that will help organizations thoughtfully and effectively grant privilege when and where it is needed -- and only when and where it is needed.

The addition of a global HTTP proxy in Apple's iOS 6, in combination with more mature cloud security services and enterprise mobility management tools, makes it easier, technically, to protect users. But privacy, policy and platform support are still sticking points.

Major database breaches and easy-to-crack selections underscore the vulnerability of our most common authentication mechanism. So what's the alternative for protecting our online lives? To find out, we polled a range of security experts.

Automation and orchestration are all the rage among IT architects these days. One of the best places to apply the technology is to disaster recovery. Most organizations still want a "go" button, but after that, timely recovery requires automation. Here's what you need to know to make it happen.