Bloor Security Blog

Welcome to the Bloor Security Blog blog on IT-Director.com. Simply click on one of the links from the list below, or delve into the Archives for older material.

Recent Blog Posts

Why the role of the CISO needs to change
Research conducted by Pricewaterhouse Coopers found that, in 2006, just 22% of more than 7,000 organisations surveyed had a CISO or equivalent function, but that proportion had grown to more than 80% by 2011. However, according to a recent report by...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 30th April '13

The value of big data in security
One of today's buzzwords is big data. Volumes of information generated are increasing rapidly, driven in part by increased take up of mobile technologies and the growing number and range of machine-to-machine communications as ever more equipment,...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 24th December '12

Advanced threats require advanced weapons
The threats we face today are no longer smash-and-grab raids, looking for instant gain. Rather, perpetrators are looking to get a deep foothold into the network. They use subterfuge to trick their way into the organisation that is being specifically...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 3rd December '12

Security proving to be a fruitful area for investment
The technology landscape is changing fast, bringing much disruptive change that provides organisations with new ways to streamline their businesses, reach out to customers more effectively and keep their workers productive. Among the hottest trends...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 25th October '12

How telcos can grow their business and manage risk
Among the many challenges that telecommunications providers face are the need to transform and consolidate their businesses. They need to adopt new business models that allow them to move away from commodity services such as voice traffic where...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 22nd October '12

Trust as the foundation of security
Trust is essential for building a sustainable business. Security is essential for building trust. To build trust in electronic networks, security needs to be built into a suitable framework, rather than being bolted on in a piecemeal fashion. The...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 17th September '12

IPv6: where are we now?
According to the US government, the strength and vitality of our economy, infrastructure, public safety and national security have been built on the foundation of cyberspace. The McKinsey Global Institute recently published a study that aimed to...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 26th July '12

Take a more holistic view of email security
Emails are essential business communications and collaboration tools and the vast majority of business information is, at some point of its lifecycle, communicated via emails and their attachments. Even though the use of other forms of...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 30th April '12

Keynote Panel at InfoSec 2012 - Smart Devices
Any Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) strategy needs a robust security governance and policy in place to allow such a concept to work effectively. However mobile devices have their own specific security concerns, from secure payment on smart devices, to...
Nigel Stanley, Bloor Research | 20th April '12

Taking the offensive on endpoint security
Buzz phrases of the day include consumerisation of IT and BYOD--bring your own device. The former phrase refers to the use of increasingly powerful and feature-rich devices, be they PCs, smartphones or tablet computers, by consumers. The meteoric...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 29th February '12

RSA Cybercrime Trends Report 2012
RSA has recently published their 2012 cybercrime trends report. They calculate that every minute, 232 computers are infected by malware, despite on going education and awareness campaigns. Unfortunately the incompetent and non-malicious user will...
Nigel Stanley, Bloor Research | 13th February '12

Getting ahead in the cloud
Cloud-based computing is growing faster than the IT sector as a whole. There are plenty of analysts throwing numbers about regarding cloud spending. Here are some from Forrester Research: in 2011, US$40.7 billion was spent on public, private and...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 30th January '12

Migrating to Exchange 2010 and email archiving options
According to recent research, Microsoft Exchange accounts for 65% of email servers in use in organisations today. Many of these are deployments of Exchange 2003, for which Microsoft no longer offers support, and Exchange 2007. According to the...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 7th November '11

Best practices for email archiving
Given the amount of business information that is contained in the multitude of emails received and sent every day and the need to preserve business records and correspondence for regulatory compliance and governance purposes, as well as for dealing...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 3rd October '11

What did IPv6 Day prove?
IPv6 Day came and went without much fanfare. That is because, according to participants, it worked. True, there were a few problems encountered, but no more than expected and that was one of the main points of the exercise anyway. According to...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 30th August '11

The security challenges of modern data centres
To reduce complexity, a high proportion of organisations are looking at modernising their data centre infrastructure through consolidation, virtualisation and by leveraging the cloud. In traditional data centres, security controls can be applied to...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 29th August '11

Whitelisting and change control for improving integrity
Today's security threats are complex and sophisticated and are getting ever harder to defend against. Attackers use multiple methods and vectors to try to bury deep into networks and are increasingly looking for longer term gain, rather than just a...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 16th August '11

IPv6 Day
The internet protocol (IP) is the primary communications protocol for determining how data packets are routed around the internet and is responsible for the addressing system that ensures traffic is routed to the intended destination. The current...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 13th June '11

Secure Systems Development Conference - A Must See!
On Thursday 19th May 2011 I will be speaking at The 2nd International Secure Systems Development Conference in London on the subject of smartphone security, entitled I own your smart phone (and of course your private life and your business life) But...
Nigel Stanley, Bloor Research | 27th April '11

BBC Interviews Nigel Stanley on Phone Hacking
Another phone hacking story went live last week here  This was a package we had recorded a couple of weeks ago and it was scheduled for release during InfoSec 2011 week - as if that week wasn't going to be busy enough!The video demonstrates just how...
Nigel Stanley, Bloor Research | 26th April '11

BBC Story on Bloor Research into Jihadists use of Smartphones
An interesting story from the BBC based on some research I have been doing with Nico Prucha based at the University of Vienna. We found jihadists were compiling packages of information designed to be received on smartphones. They contained copies of...
Nigel Stanley, Bloor Research | 26th April '11

DDoS attacks: coming to a network near you
There has already been much fallout from the recent massive release of information by the WikiLeaks organisation—including attacks on WikiLeaks itself by those angered by its actions and aiming to disrupt and discredit the organisation. This...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 24th February '11

Web security in an always-on world
My habits are not dissimilar to those of many others. In the morning, my first act is to collect my phone from beside the bed, check my email accounts and then look to see who has posted what on Facebook and Twitter. All these services are based in...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 17th February '11

Critical infrastructure under attack
Critical infrastructure is a term that is used to describe assets and facilities that are essential for the functioning of society and the economy. It encompasses a wide range of vital assets, including utilities and communications networks, food...
Fran Howarth, Bloor Research | 14th February '11