IT-Security not less important in 2007

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Recent news and information about the IT industry show that 2007 will see no end of security holes and virus attacks on PCs.

Within the first few days of the new year several security holes in applications and operating systems were revealed. For its monthly Patchday on Tuesday Microsoft provided four security updates, while four others were cancelled. The four published patches fix problems in the Windows operating system and in Microsoft Office. No reason was given for holding back the other updates. However, the German IT publisher heise.de comments: "a number of critical security leaks, for which functional exploits already exist, remain open."

Yet these security problems do not exclusively apply to Microsoft. Over the last days problems with the recent Linux kernel and applications for Apple Mac OS X (iPhoto, pdf treatment, dmg image files) became known. Security updates for Adobe Acrobat Reader and Opera web browser have also been published.

Starting in February the long awaited Microsoft Vista will officially be distributed. However, many journals advise against an overhasty change. For example, the new operating system is currently not yet directly supported by software that was developed for XP. Tests have further shown that performance is slightly weaker than under XP.

In the long run even the new operating system will not remain safe from malware. Finding security breaches in software is especially lucrative for those operating from the underground, but even security providers such as iDefense pay a lot for revealing such security holes and developing exploits.

In face of the continuously growing number of infections and existing viruses, exploits, trojans, worms and vulnerabilities the new year will not see any reversed trends regarding IT security.

Microsoft Security Bulletin Summary for January 2007

Overview about recent security information (only in German): http://www.heise.de/security/news/