June 2002 News

• Carbon may become this years Silicon
• PDAs become security risk
• Blades are getting sharper
• StarOffice wins analysts' support
• Firewalls get personal
• Will it be a marriage in heaven?

Rant of the Month

Relating information technology to strategic business goals is the challenge. Doing this within the constraints of a value proposition is the holy grail. This is a bit of a rant about the disconnect between the business and IS communities.

The normal business axiom is to invest in capability to gain an advantage - "speculate to accumulate". All too often there is no direct way to measure the benefits so they become less visible or intangible and therefore the investment becomes a cost. Why does this happen? IT people don't think like business people is the resounding response. Just a minute, is this true. Most IT investments are justified on cost reduction or technical reasons. Sounds like business thinking to me. How is this measured? Well cost reduction is based on less people, less maintenance, less capital, etc. Technical reasons might include faster processor, increased capacity, improved reliability, improved availability - and how does that help the business?

In all too many cases the investments are not being fully exploited so the benefits are being diluted. OK that must be the fault of IT. In many cases the business process changes have been too difficult to implement so the cost reductions have not been as high as predicted. And those headcount reductions have not kicked in because we are now in a growth mode and need the resources.

It is the quantification of the intangibles that needs to be resolved so that we can relate information technology to the business.

Carbon may become this years Silicon

PDAs become security risk

Business data is being copied onto PDAs which are then left unprotected because users are not safeguarding their devices. The latest statistics are:

• 89% of staff PDAs used as business diary
• 36% store corporate data on PDAs
• 71% of sensitive data is not encrypted
• 50% store passwords and PINs on PDAs
• 37% create documents/spreadsheets

Blades are getting sharper

With HP, Fujitsu, Siemens and RLX Technologies are among the many vendors of rack-mounted blade servers planning to ship new products with higher processor densities this year. Blade servers are predicted to reach $4.5bn sales by 2005. With level of focus as sharp as this blades will become honed over the next few years.

StarOffice wins analysts' support

* Available in Professional version £258.79 (upgrade) source GIGA

Firewalls get personal

Now that users are not always attached to their corporate LANs they are exposed to attacks when they are connected to the Internet. These attacks can get quite personal when you are moving from site to site as you surf the net. The answer is a personal firewall to kill the cookies, stop the denial of service attacks, defend against the Trojan horses and the penetration attacks. Windows XP comes with a firewall which can be turned on and off. There are other software solutions which can be configured to do more interesting and personal things.

Will it be a marriage in heaven?

Now it has happened even more pundits came out of the woodwork to talk about the relative merits of the union. It will not last because they are incompatible, they don't have the same interests, they come from different backgrounds and they have different cultures. Well it is a marriage and like all marriages they will take time to settle down. One will become dominant and set the new direction. Will it last? Who knows, but what is sure is that it will be an interesting relationship. I wish Mr. Compaq and Mrs. H. Packard all the best.

Shorties

• Microsoft could face EU privacy probe to verify whether .net Passport breaches European privacy laws.
• Klez.H virus is more rampant than SirCam as the authors change their tactics to engage in prolonged attacks. The Klez.H success lies in its ability to cover its tracks and deceive recipients.
• Ratners-Online is the latest internet jewelry venture to offer branded products at undercut high-street prices. Lets hope that Gerald keeps his mouth shut this time.
• The NHS Purchasing and Supply Agency has become the first government department to achieve full certification to British Standard 7799 for its information security management system.
• If you want broadband then go to Belgium, Sweden, Denmark, Holland, Austria, Germany, Finland, Spain, Ireland, France or even Portugal. The UK is so far behind that it might not ever catch up.
• Microsoft have been lobbying the Pentagon to stop using open-source applications because they threaten security and intellectual property. The Microsoft has suggested that an alternative proprietary system would be more secure - wonder whose!!!
• Cambridge University college has banned the use of Outlook e-mail because of virus attacks. Not the students but the PCs.
• Online Sainbury's not expected to be profitable until 2004. This "e-business" business is not as easy as everybody expected. It is a "must have" part of business that can be profitable as long as it is treated with the respect it deserves.