Certain organizations - such as banks and other financial-service firms, or government agencies or contractors - must be concerned about this even more than most employers are. There are four points to consider:

If employees can walk out the door of those organizations with reports, drawings, diskettes, files, and anything else in their pockets or briefcases (as they almost always can), then it's incorrect to say that telecommuting presents a new and different security risk.

There are many hardware and software solutions for maintaining remote-access security. They aren't completely secure - nothing is. But they are reasonable and prudent barriers to unauthorized access.

If you select the right people as telecommuters AND (if necessary) provide them with locking file cabinets at home AND train them about their responsibility to keep private or confidential information secure, you have taken reasonable safeguards.

There are some (but fewer than most managers imagine) applications that probably should not be done remotely, no matter how many preventive steps you take. Even if you have every imaginable safeguard in place, senior management may just not feel comfortable having that work done away from the central office. If that's the case, then it's generally better to keep those tasks inside the office.