Oracle fixes bugs with mega patch

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An industry still in transition

Seven or eight years ago, security was still largely a matter of user privileges, keeping an employee in accounts payable from seeing the personnel records of the human resources department. But the architecture of products laid out back then or before just didn't conceive of the interconnected world in which we live. It's funny how many of the Windows holes, even some of the recent ones, date back to NT 4.0, a product released in 1996. These are flaws that existed for NINE YEARS without anybody (either the armies of security researchers or hackers) finding them. And for anybody who thinks that their software is immune, give a few thousand hackers nine years with more than 100 million targets and see how your system holds up.

Anyway, we've seen a gradual move toward schemes that rely on user ignorance (e.g., Phishing) to accomplish their goals. Oddly, this is an encouraging sign as it indicates the OS is no longer the weakest security link. The next couple of years will tell whether the industry can cope. Is it possible to plug all the holes in an architecture like Windows XP? Will a newer architecture like Vista suffer the same problems? And what about programs like Oracle, Outlook, or media players? Will the OS become so secure that they become the focus hackers? I have no hope that the industry can completely protect people from themselves, but they shouldn't have to worry about threats to their security from worms, viruses, and trojans.

Posted by: Rodney Davis   Posted on: 10/19/05 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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