Dragan on Security

This is really interesting development of situation with Windows Vista security. In article / interview “Allchin Suggests Vista Won’t Need Antivirus” with Jim Allchin published at BetaNews web site you may read:

During a telephone conference with reporters yesterday, outgoing Microsoft co-president Jim Allchin, while touting the new security features of Windows Vista, which was released to manufacturing yesterday, told a reporter that the system’s new lockdown features are so capable and thorough that he was comfortable with his own seven-year-old son using Vista without antivirus software installed.

Read full article here.

Anyway, Allchin responded and explained situtaion on Windows Vista Team Blog by “Windows Vista: Defense in depth“. Read it here.

Also, long time Microsoft watcher, Mary Jo Foley, concurs. Read article “When Microsoft conspiracy theories spin out of control” published on ZDNet, here.

This is hot topic nowadays. The Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standard was created by major credit card companies to safeguard customer information. Visa, MasterCard, American Express, and other credit card associations mandate that merchants and service providers meet certain minimum standards of security when they store, process and transmit cardholder data.

When customers offer their bankcard at the point of sale, over the Internet, on the phone, or through the mail, they want assurance that their account information is safe. That’s why Visa USA has instituted the Cardholder Information Security Program (CISP). Mandated since June 2001, CISP is intended to protect Visa cardholder data–wherever it resides–ensuring that members, merchants, and service providers maintain the highest information security standard.

In 2004, the CISP requirements were incorporated into an industry standard known as Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standard resulting from collaboration between Visa and MasterCard to create common industry security requirements. Visa USA maintains CISP as the managing program for data security compliance endorsing the PCI Data Security Standard.

Sources: Visa, MasterCard, American Express and VeriSign websites.

Interesting article about spreading unauthorized instant messaging and peer-to-peer file sharing programs as well other applications that are not officially sanctioned or supported by the enterprise or IT staff appeared on internetnews.com. This kind of unauthorized applications running within the enterprise got name “greynets”.

Read full article here.