World Cup viewing may wreak havoc on office computers across UK: Survey

A new survey has revealed that next month’s football World Cup in South Africa may wreak havoc on office computers across the UK, as millions of working Britons are planning to watch the event on their work machines.

According to a survey by Eclipse, an Internet service provider for small businesses and home users, 54% working Brits are planning to watch the World Cup on their work computer.

Eclipse claims that it might lead to office computer systems to slow down at the very least and, in some cases, crash entirely.

“UK workers clearly want to watch World Cup matches live on their PCs. However, we advise all businesses to be mindful about the impact this could have on their day-to-day business operations,” Sky News quoted Clodagh Murphy, from Eclipse, as saying.
 
“Streamed content uses a lot of bandwidth and this could seriously impact the performance of their business Internet connection. It could take much longer to download important files or use business-critical applications such as e-commerce sites, email or online backup,” she added.

Murphy further said there could be a potentially disruptive surge in broadband traffic, especially on June 23, when England plays against Slovenia.

“We expect huge interest in that match as it is England’s only group game that happens during the working day. It will be interesting to see how it impacts networks,” Murphy said.

“Companies need to be wary about a potential drain on employee productivity and the efficiency of their IT systems that the streaming of the World Cup could cause,” she added.