Security market buoyant for resellers

Open source increasingly attractive as Microsoft flaws harm sales

Fears about security flaws in Microsoft products are driving some resellers to consider open source alternatives, but overall the security market is buoyant.

Last week Microsoft announced three new vulnerabilities and a major security breach.

The first flaw affects Word and Excel external updates, and could lead to information disclosure.

The second relates to Windows XP help and support centre functions that could enable file deletion. Both are classified as 'moderate'.

The third flaw, relating to the elevation of privileges in SQL Server web tasks, is rated 'critical'.

Meanwhile security at Microsoft's BetaPlace was shown to be lacking when hackers stole the user information of 20,000 beta testers.

The company was unable to comment on the investigations, or reveal how many of the testers are based in the UK.

"Microsoft's recent problems have heightened awareness among vendors and customers that there are other options," said David Ellis, director of e-security at Unipalm.

"Overall the security market is the most buoyant sector at the moment. Nevertheless some Microsoft shops are now looking around at open source alternatives."

That Microsoft is losing server software support is not in doubt. According to the company's last quarterly results, sales of server software (up 5.8 per cent in the last year) were increasing at their slowest rate in the past three years and those at the top have no doubt of the reasons.

In an interview with financial news specialists Bloomberg, Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer identified open source as the next big threat to future profits, and cited Linux as one of the reasons for comparatively slow server sales growth.

Matthew West, technical support manager for Norman Security Defense Systems, said: "There's definitely a big market for open source, particularly with security and server applications.

"At least with open source there are no secrets and problems get solved as they arrive, rather than waiting for a fix from a private company."