With more than 600 million individuals worldwide now on the Internet, cybercriminals are taking advantage of users, enterprises and unsecured systems to usher in a new era of high-profit, low-overhead crimes, according to Gartner.

Gartner analysts predicted that through 2005, 20% of enterprises will experience a serious (beyond virus) Internet security incident. These crimes are targeting information and intellectual property.

While the majority of enterprises will not face such an attack, companies must still take the proper precautions. Being a victim of one of these security incidents could be much more costly for enterprises if they don't protect themselves.

"It takes only one unsecured machine on a network to create potential risk for everyone else," said Richard Hunter, VP and Gartner Fellow. "The risks and the costs of defenses are high and the trend is moving both upward."

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