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Issue
February 2008
Welcome to the February of 2008 of BH
Consulting's Security Watch Newsletter. In this month's issue we
provide some updates to what has been going on in BH Consulting, alert you to
some upcoming events in 2008 and provide you with some updates on the latest
news happening in the world of information security.
Support
Focus Ireland
If you have found any items in our
Security Watch Newsletter to be of use to you we ask that you
make a donation to
Focus Ireland who
work tirelessly supporting 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.
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
"Managing
Information Security with ISO 27001" Training Course
Further to the recent success of the
“Managing Information Security with the ISO 27001
Information Security Standard” course
that we hosted with the
Centre for Software Engineering,
the next course has been scheduled for the 15th
and 16th Of April 2008. If you are interested in attending or
require more information you can
contact us or find details on the course
on the
Centre For Software Engineering’s website.
Security Watch Blog Finalist at Irish Blog Awards.
 For
the second year in a row our
Security Watch Blog
was nominated in the category for Best Business Blog in the
Irish Blog Awards. A sincere thank
you to those of you who nominated us and to the judges who felt our Blog worthy
of being entered into the final of the competition. While we did not win
the award, that honour fell once again to
Ice Cream Ireland, being nominated and selected
for the final were a cause of great celebration to us. Who knows, maybe
next year we can prove that three times is a charm?
Brian Honan Interviewed for Secured
Magazine
Our senior consultant, Brian Honan, took part in an interview for
Secured Magazine on the topic of protecting your company against the trusted
insider threat. In light of the recent
breach of information security by the
Société Générale rogue
trader, Jérôme Kerviel, the article serves as a timely reminder as to how those
entrusted with protecting and managing organisational assets can sometimes be
the ones to betray the trust placed in them.
BH Consulting Supported Safer Internet
Day
 For the
second year in a row BH Consulting proudly supported
Safer Internet Day which fell on the 12th of
February 2008. Safer Internet Day is
organised by
Insafe, a network of 23 nodes in 21 countries
funded through the EU Safer Internet Programme, and is aimed at children and
younger Internet users. Each year a series of events are run to promote safer
use of the internet and draw younger people’s attention to the skills required
to use computers and the internet as safely as possible.
This year the theme for
Safer Internet Day was “Life online is
what YOU make of IT” and was aimed at helping young people better
understand the impact the online world can have on their lives, both positively
and negatively. More information about this year's event is available on our
Security Watch Blog.
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 free whitepapers available for download
free from our
white papers page.
LATEST THREAT LEVELS
Get more information on the latest updates on current threats at
our online resources page;
FEATURES
SANS Training Coming To Dublin
SANS is returning to
Dublin in April 2008 to provide three training courses.
The event will run from April the 7th to the
12th. This year's event was very successful. Not only is the quality
of the training superb, the networking opportunities to meet with information
security professionals from all around Europe, and indeed the World, are
fantastic.
SANS Dublin 2008 should be even better, and with the current euro to
dollar rate the courses are particularly good value for those of us based in
Europe.
Data Breach at IBTS Was Not in Breach of
Data Protection Act
The
loss of an encrypted CD in New York containing
the data on over 170,000 people who used
the services of the Irish
Blood Transfusion Board between July and October of 2007 was
not
in breach of the Data Protection Act according to the office of the
Data Protection Commissioner. The IBTS state that the data were sent to a
US software development company based in New York as part of a software upgrade
of the IBTS systems. The data were sent by disc and encrypted with 256 AES
encryption. The investigations by the Data Protection Commissioner
concluded that the IBTS had taken all the necessary precautions to ensure the
confidentiality of the information sent.
Data breaches cost £47 per record
A
recent report from the
Ponemon Institute,
and sponsored by PGP
and Symantec,
highlights that the average cost of a security breach within the United Kingdom
STG£47 per record. The survey found that the largest portion of the cost
is attributed to lost business resulting in customers moving to competing
companies upon becoming aware of the breach. In all, this accounted for
46% of the cost, other costs included detection, notification and clean up
costs.
Researchers Break Disk Encryption
The
Wired Blog highlights
research conducted by the
Electronic
Frontier Foundation and
Princeton University have discovered a way to
circumvent full disk encryption on computers, even when they are turned off....
Click
here for more
MakeITsecure 2008
February saw the launch of Ireland’s third national security awareness campaign,
makeITsecure. The
makeITsecure website has been revamped with
updated content to help people understand the threats they face and provides
hints and tips on how to keep themselves secure online. For the first time this
year’s campaign is also an all-Ireland event with activities happening on both
sides of the border with the culmination of events leading to the national
security day on February 15th... 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
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