WHAT INNOVATION MEANS TO IT SECURITY

WHAT INNOVATION MEANS TO IT SECURITY 

 

Innovation in IT security is in the approach taken to managing risk. From our point of view, this entails a proactive and unified approach, which means shifting the landscape of the security market.

In order to survive unprecedented change related to security with the everyday challenges of new viruses, internal and external risks, data leakage, malware and phishing, it is vital you know everything that you have to protect and what weaknesses exist on your network. Once this has been done, how do you control and report that all your network and data assets remain at the desired state of security? The risks of a disaster happening are high if this is not done; and more importantly, how can you claim you are well governed?

According to the 11th Annual CSI survey, virus attacks, unauthorised access to network, lost and stolen laptops and mobile hardware, and theft of proprietary information or intellectual property account for more than 74 per cent of financial losses. Also, 75 per cent of Fortune 1000 companies fell victim to data leakage in 2006. And 53 per cent of organisations would never know what data was on a lost USB device.

Companies must identify new and existing security platforms that integrate many features into one suite. A combined solution will enable organisations to use one suite for real time vulnerability assessment, remediation, validation, policy management and enforcement, and reporting across the entire enterprise. This provides unified protection and control of all enterprise servers and endpoints. Innovation is often about simplification.

This proactive approach manages risk far more effectively than reactive security that, in the words of the IDC research director Charles Kolodgy, "drives a maddening environment of ad hoc and emergency updates to signatures, patches and security policies."

Chris Wood, director, PatchLink Australia and New Zealand

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