Dennis Fisher

As hackers continue to find ways around edge-of-network security walls, several companies are readying software and appliances that drive protection deeper—to database files. Two companies, Vormetric Inc. and Decru Inc., this week will unveil products that encrypt database files in storage as well as in transit and give administrators close control over access. Later this […]

Symantec Corp. officials are defending their practices for handling postings to the BugTraq mailing list in the face of criticism from an upstart competitor. The way the list is run hasnt changed since Symantec acquired BugTraqs owner, SecurityFocus, last summer, executives say. “What I can tell you is that we never delay posting any message […]

Hoping to engender a greater level of trust by consumers in e-commerce Web sites, VeriSign Inc. and nCipher plc. on Monday announced a new hardware-based SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) certificate that the companies say should help protect sites against data theft and Web-site spoofing. The Hardware Protected SSL Certificate will fill the same identification role […]

Network Associates Inc. on Friday wrapped up an eventful—and very expensive—week with the announcement that it is buying Entercept Security Technologies Inc. for $120 million in cash. This is the second major acquisition in three days for NAI, which also purchased IntruVert Networks Inc. for $100 million on Tuesday. Both Entercept and IntruVert sell intrusion-prevention […]

A rash of fast-spreading worms is being blamed for a more than tenfold increase in the number of security events on the Internet in the first three months of this year. The number of confirmed attacks and incidents was also up 37 percent over those in the fourth quarter of 2002, according to a new […]

Shaking off its recent accounting woes, Network Associates Inc. on Wednesday paid $100 million in cash to acquire IntruVert Networks, a 2-year-old startup that sells intrusion prevention solutions. IntruVert, based in San Jose, Calif., has a line of intrusion prevention appliances, known as the IntruShield, that combine denial-of-service protection with signature and anomaly based attack […]

Several security-related April Fools Day hoaxes began floating around the Internet Tuesday, several of which ruthlessly satirized the security industry and its denizens. From phony vulnerability advisories warning that the end of the world is upon us to a “product announcement” for a tool that automatically strikes back at hackers, the hoaxes have become far […]

Symantec Corp. officials are defending their practices for handling postings to the BugTraq mailing list in the face of criticism from an upstart competitor. The way the list is run and when messages are posted hasnt changed at all since Symantec acquired BugTraqs owner, SecurityFocus, last summer, executives say. “What I can tell you is […]

Despite months of speculation and discussion about the U.S. governments cyber-warfare capabilities, security and defense experts say there is little chance the military will use such weapons in the war against Iraq. While government agents have the tools and expertise to launch crippling attacks on Iraqi computer networks, telecommunications systems and other vital pieces of […]

Eighteen thousand computers tied together in less than 24 hours; a virtual army of machines, standing ready to do the will of their new master. Think of the possibilities that kind of processing power holds: cracking immense encryption keys or helping to sequence the human genome or even aiding the search for transmissions from extraterrestrials. […]

A pro-American hacker on Thursday defaced the Web site of the Al-Jazeera satellite news channel. The incident caps off a tumultuous week for the channel, one in which its site was the target of a denial-of-service of attack and has been largely unavailable for hours at a time. The defacement was done by a hacker […]

Security vendor Network Associates Inc. plans to restate three years of earnings after investigations by the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Department of Justice turned up some information that casts doubt on the validity of the previously stated numbers. Company executives said Wednesday that they will revise the earnings statements for 1998, 1999 and […]