Larry Seltzer

The network perimeter at the typical enterprise is getting to be a crowded place. Youve got firewalls and VPN concentrators at the very outside. Youve got intrusion detection and prevention, virus scanners, e-mail security devices, and boxes to do network access control and content filtering. Of course you might have outsourced some services, such as […]

If youre going to run Windows on your computer, then at some level you have to trust Microsoft. This would seem to me to be a pretty basic and obvious point, but its lost on the folks who are suing Microsoft over the behavior of the Windows Genuine Advantage program. Theyre willing to run massive […]

I consider it part of my job to run as many different anti-virus products as I can on my network. Its for the same reasons that I make a point of using both Internet Explorer and Firefox, but swapping around anti-virus software is much harder. In the last two or three years Ive run Norton, […]

The move to “security as a service” may be largely a conspiracy to increase prices, but maybe it doesnt have to end up that way. Up top here I should concede that I made a careless error in a recent column by forgetting the fact that Microsofts OneCare includes a license to protect up to […]

About 10 years ago I was in a meeting with Bill Gates and he said that, for security purposes, Microsoft would probably have to require digital signatures on device drivers at some point. It finally has set rules for such a system, although it has been optional to sign device drivers and other executables for […]

Someone at Microsoft must have wanted to clean house so they could go on vacation when school let out. The June Patch Tuesday contains a large list of vulnerabilities that seem, at least at first glance, to be severe and scary. And yet this will probably become like most of the other patch days, even […]

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. This is one of my favorite laws, and I take […]

ICANN is widely disliked, all over the world in fact, for a variety of reasons. Now another ICANN blunder has come to light, and it is exacerbating the takeover of the domain registration process by sleazy speculators. My big gripe with ICANN is that the only rights they seem concerned about protecting in the domain […]

Im continually surprised at the number of companies in the security space, especially those marketing to consumers. It always seems like the number is growing, and I suppose its a function of the market itself growing. The companies all seem to be nervous about Microsoft entering the market, as it has finally done with the […]

Its true Microsoft says it every time, but the software maker paid particular attention to security in Windows Vista. The company took more advice and more risks than ever before, deprioritizing many other concerns that were heretofore paramount. Were still only in beta, but does it look like Microsoft has delivered? Luckily the company just […]

Its hard not to feel bad for Blue Security, the unique anti-spam company that got blackmailed out of business last week. There may be no good way to handle the situation, but that doesnt mean that we should pick a bad way to do it. Blue Securitys business was to complain, on behalf of their […]

I dont know whether to call it wishful thinking or assume evil motives, but the FCC has issued orders to communications providers to allow law enforcement access to voice-over-IP calls for surveillance purposes. The orders are part of the implementation of CALEA (the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act). In 2005, when the FCC requested […]