For years, antivirus engines have been the primary defense against viruses, worms, Trojans, bots, and all other forms of malware designed to gain access to our emails, social networking sites, and corporate networks. While collecting their signatures from honeypots and gathering self-propagating threats has been useful in detecting malicious behavior in the past, things have changed. Today’s threats aren’t propagating. They’re using social engineering to lure their victims instead, thus breaking the traditional AV model. Continue reading this post…
Web-based malware breaking traditional AV model
A call for proactive security … I prefer real protection
With industrialized hacking on the rise, organizations serious about protecting their data must take proactive measures if they expect to win the war against cybercriminals. That’s Imperva CTO Amichai Shulman’s straight-forward message to applications owners everywhere and lists some real trends that are threatening businesses everywhere. My take, this is a good list, but while proactive is good, protective is better.
In this week’s TechJournal South article, “Industrialized hacking tops five data security trends for 2010″, Mr. Shulman’s data security firm listed its top five security predictions for 2010: Continue reading this post…
Grid security still in national spotlight – Obama declares December Critical Infrastructure Protection Month
I recently wrote about a the 60 Minutes special on cyber security, and how a former chief of national intelligence didn’t believe the U.S. is prepared for a sophisticated attack that could bring down a major power grid. Opinions varied about the special itself, but the one thing people shouldn’t overlook is that cyber threats are real and that the infrastructure that protects our power grids needs to be defended.
The spotlight on this need continued last week when President Obama issued a statement saying December was Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) Month. Proclamations like these won’t change the world. Our systems won’t magically become secure, and most of the people responsible for these systems are already working hard to defend them.
That said, this proclamation adds to the increased awareness of the need for infrastructure protection against all attacks including cyber attacks. Continue reading this post…
Application whitelisting is coming … are you ready?
Sometime in 2010 virtually every new Windows PC will now come with a version of application whitelisting installed in the form of AppLocker. It’s time to start thinking about how application whitelisting will change the way you approach desktop security and how you intend to use whitelisting to protect your critical IT assets. In preparation for this shift, I thought it would be good to give some food for thought about what changes and what considerations you should give to your ultimate whitelisting strategy.
First, let’s look at what changes. Continue reading this post…
Memory Protection is an Important Component of Application Whitelisting Solutions
More companies than ever are looking at alternatives to blacklist antivirus. It isn’t hard to see why. Rampant botnets, endless patching, and signature distribution that simply can’t keep up with the threat are just a few of the reasons why IT and security professionals are looking for viable alternatives to protect their endpoints. Even Gartner group has said it is time to start over on desktop security. Continue reading this post…