Interesting article over at Computerworld Philippines. The article outlines a lack of Chief Security Officers (CSOs) within the country. I would guess that many US companies also lack CSOs with the following breadth of responsibility:

Karl Verhulst, product marketing director of Computer Associates (CA) in South Asia, added that the person being groomed to be a CSO should be senior enough because the CSO can override the chief executive officer (CEO) when it comes to security matters. "The issue is not having someone who knows what security is but someone who has the power to do something about it," Verhulst said. The CA director observes there is an urgent need for companies to create a CSO position because security is not getting enough attention at the board level.
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[Microsoft's Ayson indicated] that the CSO should, in fact, be an enabling position responsible for threats and risks in the organization. Finally, the CSO should also have the power to state how much of the total IT budget should be allotted to security.

Steve Shu