Safe as houses

Security is a journey, not a destination

A friend once said to me, "Security is a journey, not a destination." He is connected to a distributor selling security products so, of course, he would say that, but he was absolutely spot on.

Unfortunately, despite the increasing frequency of fraud, denial-of-service attacks, viruses and worms crippling home and business users alike, there are still a hell of a lot of people who are not signed up to the security quest.

Instead, they have bought the ticket, paid for the ride and are now at the destination, sitting by the pool with a Mai Tai and apparently no worries.

These are the people who wake up burned and confused. They have invested in security products and think they are safe, but they are like people who lock the front door of their house in the summer but leave the windows wide open.

As companies move to IP-based business, there are an increasing number of open windows. The problem for many end-users is that new vulnerabilities are usually found within hours of patches being released by vendors to plug security holes.

In addition, it is very time consuming for businesses to keep track of security issues when they should be concentrating on their core business.

This is perhaps why customers are turning to security resellers for help. Vendors, too, are busting a gut to help partners that are offering security solutions.

Microsoft is the latest vendor to increase its focus on security and its security partners. As one of the prime targets for attack by hackers, Microsoft has often been criticised in the past about security issues.

In reality, the company issues fixes for problems when it becomes aware of them, and in many cases the vulnerability is there because the user has not installed the patch.

But the perception is quite different, and Microsoft has probably decided that soothing customers' fears is currently a higher priority than talking to them about advanced technologies.

To this end it is enlisting its partners to 'Make it Right' in terms of security for end-users.

To this end it is reshuffling a big chunk of its business investment funding to security-focused VARs, no doubt aware that for its partners the journey is definitely more lucrative than the destination.