Paul F. Roberts

The SANS Institute last week issued the first quarterly update to its formerly annual Top 20 Internet Security Vulnerabilities list, which many organizations use as a benchmark to evaluate their network security. Holes in Microsoft Corp.s software dominate the list, as usual, but SANS also warned about security flaws in popular anti-virus and media player […]

A new identity management product from IBM allows companies to share user login and password information using open standards for federated identity management such as SAML, the Liberty Alliance or WS-Federation, IBM said. IBM plans to announce IBM Tivoli Federated Identity Manager on Monday. The new product will extend the reach of Tivolis identity and […]

A new test laboratory at Iowa State University will allow researchers to study how computer networks respond to massive Internet attacks and could lead to breakthroughs in computer defenses and forensics, said a researcher behind the project. The new test network, ISEAGE (Internet Simulation Event and Attack Generation Environment), was funded by a $500,000 grant […]

Howard Schmidt, perhaps the United States most visible chief security officer, has left online auction house eBay Inc. and is donning the jersey of a startup security hardware vendor. Schmidt said goodbye to eBay on May 1, and hello to ELI—Electronic Lifestyle Integration Inc. of Mount Laurel, N.J.—where he will be chairman of the board. […]

Hewlett-Packard Co. and Citrix Systems Inc. will combine identity and access management technology and develop products together, the companies said last week. The companies announced plans to integrate Citrixs Password Manager with HPs OpenView Identity and Access Management suite, and HP also said it selected Password Manager as its preferred enterprise single-sign-on technology for OpenView. […]

The steady rise in phishing attacks in the last year, coupled with increasingly sophisticated scams such as “pharming” attacks, is driving interest in technology to lock down critical components such as e-mail and Domain Name System. But bigger changes to the underlying Internet infrastructure may be needed, according to interviews with industry experts who will […]

Microsoft Corp., Cisco Systems Inc. and the Trusted Computing Group have big plans for their competing client integrity architectures, but while the TCG and Microsoft are still finalizing their technologies, Cisco already is moving ahead with its second wave of products. Since launching its NAC (Network Admission Control) effort in June, Cisco has been steadily […]

The movement toward a vendor-neutral, open architecture for endpoint security will pick up momentum this week when the Trusted Computing Group consortium unveils new specifications for the Trusted Network Connect architecture. However, enterprise IT managers who are waiting for integration between TNC and competing schemes from Microsoft Corp., in Redmond, Wash., and Cisco Systems Inc., […]

The movement toward a vendor-neutral, open architecture for endpoint security will get some momentum this week when the Trusted Computing Group consortium unveils new specifications for the Trusted Network Connect architecture at the Interop trade show in Las Vegas. But enterprise IT managers who are waiting for integration between TNC and competing schemes from Microsoft […]

Media giant Time Warner said Monday that it lost a container of computer backup tapes with information on current and former employees. The tapes, which were misplaced by an outside data-storage company, contained company data including the names and Social Security numbers of U.S. employees and their dependents, the company said in a statement. Time […]

Two recent reports suggest that the flood of phishing attacks that has washed over Internet users in recent months may be ebbing. Managed e-mail provider Postini Inc. said Monday that phishing attempts decreased 45 percent between March and April. The report comes just days after the APWG (Anti-Phishing Working Group) industry group released its March […]

The SANS Institute issued an update to its annual list of the Top 20 Internet security vulnerabilities on Monday, warning of 12 new holes that pose a critical threat to organizations that do business on the Internet. The new vulnerabilities were culled from more than 600 security flaws discovered in the first three months of […]