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Issue
December 2006
In this month's issue of our Security Watch Newsletter we
update you on some of the latest happenings at BH Consulting, highlight a
research project on Radicalisation and Terrorist Recruitment on the Internet,
information security predictions for 2007, highlight the SANS Dublin event, remind
you about our Security Watch Blog and provide some interesting news stories from
around the world.
Christmas Wishes
We would like to take this opportunity to wish all our readers a very happy and
peaceful Christmas and we also hope that 2007 is a very prosperous and secure
New Year to you all.
As part of our
Community Responsibility Programme BH Consulting is not sending out
Christmas cards this year, instead we have donated money to two very worthy
charities who do sterling work in helping those less fortunate than ourselves;
-
The Central Remedial Clinic
 The
Central Remedial Clinic the national centre for the care, treatment and
development of children and adults with physical and multiple disabilities.
Services are
provided for people with physical conditions ranging from the very rare
to the more familiar, such as cerebral palsy, spina bifida, muscular
dystrophy and arthrogryposis. The staff at the CRC do
sterling work in helping children and adults reach their potential and a
sign of their success is the many smiling faces of the children who
attend the Clinic. While the Clinic is largely funded by the state
there are still significant shortfalls that need to be made up from
voluntary donations. If you have missed the CRC's Santa Bear "Buy
a Bear and Show You Care" Appeal, then please consider making an
online donation.
-
Focus Ireland
The other is
Focus Ireland
who support the homeless throughout Ireland. Focus Ireland
aims to advance the right of people-out-of-home to live in a place they call
home through quality services, research, and advocacy. The objectives of
Focus Ireland are to respond to the needs of people out-of-home and those at
risk of becoming homeless, through a range of appropriate high quality services,
to provide emergency transitional and long-term accommodation for people
out-of-home, to campaign and lobby for the rights of people out-of-home
and the prevention of homelessness. No sum is too small and all is
put to excellent use so please consider
donating to this worthwhile cause.
If you have found our Security Watch newsletter or our
Blog to be of
use or of interest, we ask you to
make a donation to either of the above charities. No sum is too small and all is
put to excellent use.
We wish you, you colleagues and your families a Very
Peaceful and Merry
Christmas And a Secure and Prosperous 2007!!
Nollaig Shona daoibh go léir agus Athbhliain faoi shéan is
faoi mhaise daoibh, agus go mba seacht fearr sinn go léir ag an am seo ar an
bhliain seo chugainn!
About BH Consulting
BH Consulting was founded in answer to demands for an independent consulting
firm to assist clients gain a competitive edge by achieving IT Operational
excellence in deploying, managing and securing their IT infrastructure. With
over 20 year’s experience, we provide you with access to in-depth expertise,
experience and technical know-how. Backed with our quality processes and
commitment to deliver, BH Consulting provides clients with quality solutions at
cost effective rates.
BH CONSULTING NEWS
Brian Honan Interviewed by
Irish Times Regarding the Ongoing CERT Project
BH Consulting's Senior Consultant Brian Honan has
been working for a number of months in his spare time researching whether or not
Ireland needs a Computer Emergency Response Team. This has involved talking to
various Government bodies, organisations of various sizes and in different
industries and engaging with industry representative bodies to determine the
level of interest and requirements in such a service.
On Friday the 1st of December the Irish
Times newspaper published an article on the project's progress thus far and it
is available
online. Also a similar article appeared on the
SiliconRepublic.com. If you have any
thoughts or comments on this project please
let us know.
BH Consulting Advises on Email
Security
The latest issue of the Knowledge
Ireland magazine published an article on email security. Brian Honan was
interviewed extensively for this article and outlined how organised criminal
gangs are becoming more and more involved in cyber crime and using email as a
means to target individuals and companies. Brian also pointed out that
companies need to ensure they have a secure email infrastructure to protect
themselves from potential legal issues arising from staff abusing the systems.
If you require any assistance on how to develop and implement acceptable usage
policies or how to architect and implement a secure email infrastructure then
please do not hesitate to
contact us.
Security Trends for 2007
The SANS Institute published its top 20 predictions relating to information
security for 2007. The list was compiled by "twenty respected leaders in
cyber security", of which our Senior Consultant Brian Honan is one.
SiliconRepublic.Com covered the report as did
the
British Computer Society.
A downloadable version of the list in Adobe Acrobat format (PDF) is available
from the British Computer Society
here.
Terrorist Radicalisation & Recruitment on
the Internet
The Institute for European Studies has launched a
Blog to
support its research into the topic of Terrorist Radicalisation & Recruitment on
the Internet. The purpose of the project is to identify what would be involved
in providing some means of preventing European citizens from accessing terrorist
radical and recruiting content on the web.
This research includes looking into the legal, social, economic and technical
requirements and ramifications implementing such a system would have to support
this goal. BH Consulting, through our senior consultant Brian Honan, has already
provided some feedback to the Institute on the technical implications and how
feasible it would be to try and block access to such content.
The Institute is eager to hear the views of others and to get their insight and
input into this important topic. If you have any feedback on this subject then
please access the Institute’s
Blog and share your thoughts.
Security Watch Blog.
BH Consulting launched our
Security Watch Blog in November.
The
Security Watch Blog is intended be a valuable and informative resource for those concerned with
information security. So far the feedback has been very positive and
supportive. Visit the
Security Watch Blog yourself and let us have your feedback.
BH CONSULTING WEBSITE UPDATE
We strive at BH Consulting to provide information that is
relevant and useful in securing and running your business. To this end we
provide a range of whitepapers available for download
free from our
white papers page.
The following whitepapers are available for free download;
Information Security
IT
Operations
Other
LATEST THREAT LEVELS
Get more information on the latest updates on current threats at
our online resources page;
FEATURES
Greek Authorities Fine Vodafone €76 Million for Network
Breach
During the 2004 Greek Olympics persons unknown broke
into the Vodafone network and installed surveillance software to monitor the
calls of over 100 people including the personal mobile phone of the Greek Prime
Minister. Greek authorities have not been able to find who was responsible for
the breach. One of the reasons given is that Vodafone apparently removed the
surveillance software before the authorities were informed. The investigations
were also hampered by the suicide of an engineer employed by Vodafone who worked
on the affected system... Click
Here for more
Skype Worm
ZDNET reports that a new worm that uses Skype to propagate has
been discovered and is active. Skype provides many users with Voice Over
IP telephone services and is probably the most popular VOIP application.
Security concerns have been raised in the past about the way Skype works and
indeed this worm exploits one of those concerns. The worm is spread using
the Skype Chat (instant messaging) feature to transfer the infected file from
one system to another...
Click
Here for more.
ID Theft Gang use Encryption to Foil Police
Three cyber criminals have been convicted in the UK for their part in a gang
that stole identities and credit card details from people over a number of
years. The interesting twist to this story is one of the criminals managed
to activate an encryption routine while in handcuffs that encrypted the contents
of numerous computers. Police have so far been unable to break the
encryption and believe that the encrypted data holds evidence to even more
crimes this gang has been involved in. A good demonstration as to how
encryption can be used for good, to protect our own data, and evil, to protect
the criminals' data. ... Click
Here for more.
SANS Training Coming to Dublin
The SANS Institute
will be hosting a training event at the Red Cow Moran Hotel from April the 16th
to the 21st 2007. The courses being offered are;
For those of you interested in attending now may be a very
opportune time to book the course given the current Euro to dollar rate. This in
effect gives you a 30% discount on the course price. More details of the event
are available at SANS Click
Here for more.
Zero Day Flaw Tracker
The folks at eEye Security have
launched their
Zero Day Tracker page
which lists current 0 day vulnerabilities by order of days of exposure. A
Zero Day Vulnerability is one that is known to the those who discovered the flaw
and is not made available to the vendor of the affected product or to the public
in general. As a result these flaws can be a very effective means to
attack a network or system as due to their nature they are difficult to defend
against. The list provides a timer to show how many days it is taking a
particular vendor to develop a fix for the reported problem. It also
provides information on the flaw and what steps you can take to protect against
them. Needless to day the three latest Microsoft Word 0 Day
vulnerabilities, which are being actively exploited, are listed... Click
Here for more.
FREE SECURITY SCAN
In partnership with
Qualys, BH Consulting
are offering a for a free Network Security Scan so you can check how healthy
your network is. To find out more about what this service can do for you, visit
our free
Network Security Scan.
Alternatively contact
us or visit our website to get more details on our
risk assessment service.
This issue of Security Watch is being brought to you by BH Consulting.
If you have found this issue to be of use please support our drive to raise funds
for
Focus Ireland.
Each
Security Watch eNewsletter, and the special Security Alert issues, are produced
independently by the Windows IT Pro Custom Media Group and is distributed by
various Microsoft security partners. Each eNewsletter contains up-to-date
information about security strategies, technologies, and alerts. Each Security
Alert contains the latest information about security threats.
Additional news courtesy of
Silicon Republic,
Cnet,
Silicon and
Zdnet
To update your subscription to our newsletter
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