Cost, complexity and security concerns hold back mobile enterprise apps
Enterprise application and data security company Mobile Helix has announced the results of an independent survey of CIOs. It shows a large percentage of businesses delaying the roll out of enterprise apps on mobile devices thanks to concerns over security, costs and complexity.
Highlights of the survey, conducted among 300 CIOs in the US and UK, are that companies on average had over 400 applications within their organization but that only 22 percent of them could be accessed from mobile devices despite clear demand from employees for mobile access. Major barriers to adoption are development and support costs along with security.
NSS Labs unveils new threat modeling and forecasting services
Information security research specialist NSS Labs uses a workshop at the BlackHat USA conference today to announce new threat modeling and forecasting services to help clients better understand how they're at risk.
These new services use data from NSS's research and from its BaitNET real-time monitoring technology to deliver information about exploit and malware trends.
Cloud management makes for easier hotspot rollouts
UK-based company Managed Connections has launched its new platform as a service (PaaS) offering to provide an easy way for private and public sector organisations to set up their own wireless hotspots.
Derek Williamson, Managed Connections' Commercial Director says, "Our research shows that offering Wi-Fi hotspots will increase customer loyalty, footfall and sales which is a huge benefit to people using our services. The official Managed Connections launch comes after almost four years of research and development and on the back of this we have some really exciting additions planned for the upcoming months. We have made getting 100 percent legally compliant and highly controlled Wi-Fi and wireless broadband into a variety of venues really simple, and we can show clients how to use our platform and services as tools to bring in more customers and how to make money from them. We’re really excited by this aspect of our offering and with our systems, there is now a choice of fully managed Wi-Fi hotspot and ISP packages to suit any sized commercial venue".
Lock up your data ecommerce companies are warned
According to Imperva's recent Web Application Attack Report most applications have suffered attacks four or more times per month whilst some are under almost constant attack. In addition retail sites suffer twice the number of SQL injection attacks compared to other industries.
The report also finds that the US tops the list globally as the source of web-based attacks.
Kaspersky tops real world protection test
Independent testing organisation AV-Comparatives has released the results of its real world protection test for March to June 2013. The tests use each security suite on its default settings and live URLs that point to malware executables along with drive-by exploits.
Using a total of 1,972 test cases over the four month period the results show that all of the major security packages offer high levels of protection. Bitdefender and Kaspersky top the charts with 99.9 percent protection levels, F-Secure also manages 99.9 but ranks slightly lower as it relied on user interaction to block three of the threats.
First use of Android 'Master Key' vulnerability discovered
Security specialist Symantec is reporting the first malicious use of the Android 'Master Key' vulnerability that allows hackers to inject malicious code into apps without invalidating the digital signature.
The vulnerability was discovered earlier this month but Norton Mobile Insight has now detected its first use in the wild. Mobile Insight harvests and analyzes Android apps from marketplaces around the world and has discovered the infection labelled Android.Skullkey in two applications from China. These are legitimate apps used to make appointments with doctors.
Internet Explorer has the worst phishing catch rate of all major browsers
A new report by security research firm NSS Labs looks at the comparative performance of popular browsers when it comes to blocking phishing attacks. Over a 12-day test period the average phishing catch rate ranged from 96 percent for Firefox 19 to only 83 percent for Internet Explorer 10.
Of the other big three, Chrome 25 scored 92 percent, Safari 5 managed 95 percent, and Opera 12 scored 89 percent. Chrome, Firefox and Safari all make use of Google's Safe Browsing API so it's unsurprising that they scored within a few points of each other. Microsoft uses its own SmartScreen technology in IE, whereas Opera uses a combination of blacklists from Netcraft, PhishTank and TRUSTe.
PlanForCloud helps forecast more than $1 billion in cloud spending
Forecasting enterprise cloud costs can be hard to do well but is essential to businesses who want to implement cloud solutions effectively. RightScale announces today that its PlanForCloud product has helped companies forecast $1 billion in cloud spending since its launch last year.
By analyzing data from more than 9,500 cloud deployments, PlanForCloud has revealed a number of interesting trends. For example 70 percent of cloud spending goes on servers, 18 percent on storage and only 6 percent on data transfer, with a further 6 percent accounted for by other costs such as transaction charges and support.
New Android security tool helps businesses analyze threats
Information security consultancy MWR InfoSecurity is set to release drozer, its new open source Android testing tool, at Black Hat Arsenal in Las Vegas on August 1. Allowing dynamic analysis of applications running on Android devices, drozer is able to compromise a device using publicly available exploits so that organizations can understand how mobile exploits can threaten their business.
Based on the company's previous Mercury tool, drozer adds a number of new features, most notably the ability to get it on to an Android device remotely. Tyrone Erasmus, Senior Security Consultant at MWR InfoSecurity, says, "It is a major step forward as previously, various remote Android exploits were scattered across the internet and in some cases were not very reliable. Taking up Mercury's lead, drozer unifies these publicly available exploits into a single framework and improves the quality of the exploitation code and payloads available to the penetration tester".
Tableau Online brings business intelligence to the cloud
Tableau Software has launched a SaaS version of its Tableau Server business analytics product. The software allows users to explore and share corporate data in a reliable and secure way without the need for specialist support.
"Tableau Online will allow people to get their analytics up and running in minutes and add users in a few clicks," says Chris Stolte, Chief Development Officer and co-founder of Tableau Software. "It's completely scalable and secure and requires no infrastructure. It's the fastest way to get everyone in your company using powerful analytics to make better decisions today".
Cloud-based social collaboration aims to make businesses more productive
We're used to sharing information via social networking in our personal lives, but in the business world the impact of this has so far proved limited. Enterprise software supplier Deltek hopes to change this with the launch of Kona Business, a premium version of its cloud-based social collaboration and productivity tool.
A cross between a calendar, social network and project management tool, Kona Business brings together all of the interactions between people working on a project, allowing them to get things done more effectively and more quickly, and as it's in the cloud it can be rolled out easily via browsers or through Android and iOS apps.
Global outsourcing predicted to reach $288 billion in 2013
Analyst group Gartner says in a new report that the global market for IT outsourcing is set to reach $288 billion this year. This though represents an increase of only 2.8 percent and growth is slower than predicted by previous forecasts.
Bryan Britz, research vice president at Gartner says, "Planned new adoption of ITO remains positive in all service line segments. However, constrained IT budgets, an evolving ITO delivery model, economic conditions and cost-focused buyers are limiting the growth potential of the ITO market".
Automated migration makes for a cloudier business outlook
One of the things that puts businesses off moving their systems to the cloud is the problem of migrating all of their applications and data to a remote platform. Californian company CloudVelocity aims to address this with its launch of One Hybrid Cloud, a package that streamlines the movement of information to Amazon Web Services (AWS).
One Hybrid Cloud effectively makes AWS an extension of the corporate data center, making it possible to run existing Linux and Windows apps in the cloud without modification. It automates many of the processes required to migrate apps to the cloud and in the process the developers reckon it can reduce migration expenses by more than 90 percent.
New platform helps enterprises control documents and embrace BYOD
Point.io has released its new Baas (Backend as a Service) platform. Aimed at document management and workflow, Point.io's offering is designed to help companies maintain control of their content whilst enabling BYOD (Bring Your Own Device).
The application allows developers to build mobile apps that let users access and share content on any device efficiently and securely. Ron Rock, CEO of Point.io says, "By design, enterprises have been locking down their content for decades, but with the shift in workforce mobility it's become critical that content, and the workflows that thrive on it, are unleashed to devices beyond the corporate firewall".
Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's a virus
As superhero fans prepare to gather in San Diego for this year's Comic-Con, McAfee has revealed its first ever Most Toxic Superheroes list. The company has compiled a list of superheroes whose search results are most likely to lead to malicious websites aiming to steal fans' personal details or infect their PCs with viruses.
The top 15 are as follows, the percentages indicating the chance of landing on a website that has rested positive for online threats:
Ian's Bio
Ian spent almost 20 years working with computers before he discovered that writing about them was easier than fixing them. Since then he's written for a number of computer magazines and is a former editor of PC Utilities. Follow him on Mastodon
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