RealSecurity

There is no shortage of technology in the information security industry. As time passes, there are fewer and fewer cases of truly interesting and compelling solutions that have the potential to revolutionize the industry. However, they do come along on occasion; with no fan fair and hidden in the back of some massive vendor expo hall, but sneak up on you and the next thing you know is you can’t live without it. So, expect to be buying F-Response in the near future.

In 1996 I found a tiny package floating around the Internet called VMware. I booted up my Linux laptop and proceeded to install this little animal. Within minutes I started the application and booted my first virtual PC. Compelled to investigate further, I decided to load Windows 95, completely convinced that it would fail miserably - Win95 on Linux, are you kidding me? To my surprise, I was browsing the web using IE, in Windows 95 from a virtual PC running on Linux in just a few hours. Little did I know at the time, virtualization would make the huge rebirth that it has today.

In 1998, I was working in Germany designing a 5000 site IPSec VPN solution encompassing 125 countries for a logistics company. The options were few. Timestep had the best product during that time with many other IPSec products emerging, such as Altiga, Novell's BorderManager, and Checkpoint. Of course, Cisco was very interested, but didn't have solid IPSec code. Cisco got involved and insisted with a little work they could have a meaningful solution. This bode well for the client given that they used Cisco for all their networking gear, making the whole philosophy very attractive.

As soon as there were networks there were people using them to gain unauthorized access remote systems. Today, networks are everywhere and the Internet is the ultimate network with more and more systems becoming assimilated. What once was just computers communicating over the Internet has now expanded to include phones, game platforms, entertainment systems, and even home security systems with no end in sight. The growing use of a global network represents significant opportunities to businesses and consumers.

With the increased demands being placed on organizations to ensure privacy, integrity, and confidentiality in digital domain, the need for non-repudiation and the use of digital signatures is beginning to raise its ugly head once again. The biggest challenge for most people is the technical representation of non-repudiation and the non-technical. To add to the malaise, there is a great deal of discussion about what information should be signed to support non-repudiation, and that is where things get even more confusing.

More and more companies are expressing interest in Identity Management (ID Mgt) solutions to compensate for the increasing number of user management directories & databases, support broader regulatory compliance efforts, and address a core security issue that has been around for years - access management.