Enterprise
As enterprises try to implement more detailed security initiatives, many will find that they need outside support to achieve their goals, according to Gartner. By 2005, 60 percent of enterprises will outsource monitoring of at least one perimeter security technology. Managed security services are relatively new to the marketplace, but during the past two years an impressive expansion has occurred in the number of vendors and the range of managed-service offerings. “The target customers include those enterprises without core competencies in information security,”said Richard Hunter, vice president for Gartner. “Such enterprises have addressed perimeter security and gained experience in putting their security architectures in place, and they are looking for efficient operations, but not at the expense of their security postures,” he said.
Pro Exchange on Monday announced SPAM Smacker its new email security product for Microsoft Exchange environments. The new product provides anti-spam protection as well as content screening at the Exchange Server level for inbound SMTP emails. “Our anti-spam solution operates by snapping onto existing Exchange servers and blocking messages from reaching existing Exchange stores,” said Steve Bryant, President of Pro Exchange.
Piracy
In a broad agreement announced last week, Microsoft and AOL Time Warner essentially decided to bury the hatchet on the old browser and online services wars of the past to focus on breaking the logjam holding back digital music and movies on the Internet. Microsoft has granted the content provider a seven-year license to its Internet Explorer and Windows Media 9 technologies and its next-generation digital rights management (DRM) software. “DRM is the fulcrum of this deal,” said Richard Doherty, technology analyst with Envisioneering (Seaford, NY). “This amounts to the biggest endorsement of Microsoft DRM technology to date by one of the worlds largest media companies. In the area of DRM, Microsoft is suddenly a player, not just another company with an offering,” Doherty added. Microsoft and AOL Time Warner also agreed to collaborate on areas of public policy and legal action around online digital media as well as building consumer awareness for respecting intellectual property rights.
A day after developers at America Onlines Nullsoft unit quietly released file-sharing software, AOL pulled the link to the product from the subsidiarys Web site. The software, called Waste, lets groups set up private, secure file-sharing networks. The features of Waste are similar to those of file-swapping services such as Kazaa and the defunct Napster, but the difference is that only small networks of people (up to 50, according to the Web site) are supported.
Privacy
TiVo will begin selling advertisers data it collects on the viewing habits of its subscribers. Through a back-end technology of TiVos DVR service, TiVo executives can see which shows its users are watching live or recording and track when commercials are being watched, re-wound and watched again or zipped past through the DVRs fast-forward feature. TiVo said it does not identify individual viewers but will customize the report to track, for example, viewing habits of Silicon Valley subscribers during the Super Bowl, the finale of American Idol or the Academy Awards.
RSA Security and Thor Technologies Monday announced a partnership agreement under which the two will work closely to integrate their products. The goal is to integrate RSAs ClearTrust authentication and access management software with Thors Xellerate provisioning software by the third quarter of this year, said Jason Lewis, director of product management at RSA. Under the agreement, RSA will be allowed to ship RSA ClearTrust with some of Thors basic provisioning capabilities, such as self-service, self-registration, resetting passwords and profile updates, Lewis said.
