 COLUMN
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Security Adviser
P.J. Connolly
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Gloomy skies clearing
ALTHOUGH THE approaching gloom of winter is icing on what's already been a terrible year, there are some silver linings out there. The first of these is the announcement last month that e-mail list software vendor L-Soft would add F-Secure's anti-virus software to its popular Listserv package for Linux and Windows. This is OK by me, because I've always had high respect for F-Secure's scanning technology, even though it's been awhile since I've actually poked at the software. The good thing about partnerships like this is that they can lead to better integration of communication and security tools. Unfortunately, these arrangements don't happen often enough and often don't last when they do.
That's a shame, because right now the most important thing you can focus on is your defense against viruses, worms, and other compromising code. Yes, anti-virus technology remains the primary defense against attackers, whether or not they're pimply teenagers or cyberterrorists. I can't remember a year in which we've had so many problems. Between Anna Kournikova, Code Red, Nimda, and their variants, we were under siege long before Sept. 11. Now we're at the point where customers should check daily with their vendors for signature updates -- and if that isn't a desperate situation, I don't know what could be.
Remember all that talk a few years back about "digital immune systems" and how heuristic behavior-modeling technologies were going to make viruses a thing of the past? Sure thing, right after we cure the common cold. Vendors themselves are admitting that the goal has changed from eliminating viruses completely to slowing their spread in hopes that people will be able to use the time to patch their systems. Instead of a victory parade, we have a stalemate.
Toward the end of October, the Society for Information Management's new Information Civil Defense Task Force started to get under way. Although too many blue-ribbon committees, panels, and task forces wind up being nothing more than talking shops, my hope is that SIM's new group can actually accomplish something by giving the business community a chance to speak to government officials with one voice. Yes, I know, I'm an optimist -- at least during even-numbered hours.
I'm also feeling good because it looks like the idea of a national ID card is a nonstarter. We have enough problems with people getting drivers' licenses from their state government by bribing examiners. Imagine the temptation for low-paid clerks on the lower rungs of the civil service ladder to become black-market brokers of U.S. citizenship. There's a massive potential for fraud in the national ID card scheme. Besides, there's a part of me that associates internal passports with the Soviet Union and the NKVD.
P.J. Connolly (pj_connolly@infoworld.com) covers groupware, messaging, networking, and security for the Test Center. Get this column free via e-mail each week. Sign up at www.iwsubscribe.com/newsletters .
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