On July 28 Microsoft released two out of band patches (http://www.microsoft.com/atl) to address a serious issue known as Microsoft Active Template Library (ATL) vulnerability. Read more...

Picking up where I left off in the previous blog, there are a few more mobile trends that deserve a closer look and assess the security impact of the same. Read more...

As the mobile “r”evolution hurtles with warp speed and takes all of us with it for the joy ride, it is imperative that we step back and observe the various trends that are contributing and causing this phenomenal pace of change. I will attempt to use these trends as a watershed moment and shed light on the critical but not often discussed topic of “security” - the last bastion of protection and on which the entire mobile community depends to maintain, preserve and protect the services that we all demand and consume at will. Read more...

The idea that the firewall is dead is, well, hogwash. It might not be your father’s firewall but, believe me, firewalls are not going away. Some vendors in the industry are claiming the firewall’s dead. And if your definition of a firewall hinges on a set of features that were originally offered in the first firewalls in the late ‘80s then I suppose you might be right. But by the same reasoning you probably think we should’ve renamed the “automobile” when distributors gave way to electronic ignition systems (yes, this is a geeky guy reference). Read more...

How ready and secure is your business to take advantage of the opportunities that are available to the distributed enterprise? Read more...

Last week I spent some time chatting with one of our favorite analyst firms about the future of the WAN. He's seeing many of the same things in the industry today as we are. Demands on the WAN are getting, well, pretty demanding! And enterprises are adopting a few specific strategies to cope. One strategy is the use of MPLS-based managed services to ensure private, low-latency traffic delivery. These services are great - they do what they're supposed to do and they're not too tough to use. The service provider pretty much takes care of everything. Read more...

Being in the field quite a bit lately, affords me a great opportunity to separate fact from fiction. In talking to real live customers and prospects, one gains a unique perspective on the types of security hazards that truly keep them up at night. This information is gold and is real; better than any analyst report or trade article because it is happening now and it is firsthand unadulterated information.

For too long, our security systems have acted like territorial bureaucrats, hoarding the information that they have and refusing to share with each other. An Intrusion Detection System notices odd behavior but only logs it. A Virtual Private Network (VPN) gateway authenticates a user but doesn't pass the identity to anyone else. We must stop this madness! Coordination and cooperation are at the foundation of any successful and cost-effective security system. Read more...

Traveling, particularly by air, provides me with quality time to...get work done! Sitting in an aircraft 5 miles above terra firma unshackles me from the usual meetings, phone calls and of course, emails. Cell phones are off, connectivity (on most flights) still do not exist. It's just me and my laptop frozen in time since my last Outlook synch-up. Read more...