Wired for security
Published: 16 Sep 2004 15:40 BST
But that's what antivirus vendors would say right? You want customers to buy more --
Do you want your business or government to go down because you didn't spend money protecting PDAs or 3G phones or servers? This is a bet-your-job environment. You will lose your job if you don't have comprehensive, layered security solutions. But that has not been the concern of CSOs and CIOs that I've talked to. They are getting the funds necessary to do that. You can see from our sales and other vendors' sales that organisations are spending more money every single year.
So what is McAfee betting on?
Wireless will have a major thrust in all the new products that we do in the future. Our kids will not grow up in a wired, but a wireless environment. And that gives McAfee a whole new space to work with. Every three to five years a new dominant technology emerges and changes the industry. And wireless, in the form of 3G and PDA devices, will have a dramatic impact on our future.
What is the fundamental difference between wired and wireless protection?
It's a new architecture in many cases, in terms of what you need to protect. In the case of a 3G, Internet-enabled phone, the service provider has to make sure that it is an always-on and always-reliable environment. And in such an environment, the user doesn't have time to go out and buy the antivirus application. It has to be downloaded within a couple of seconds. So it is changing our thinking too about how we can deliver our solutions.
What is McAfee doing in the non-PC protection area?
In October this year, we will deliver security software protection for 3G phones. We started working with NTT DoCoMo in December 2001, so it's taken us three years. We will be the first company to deliver virus protection for 3G phones. This is a great opportunity for us.
Tell us more about this product.
There is going to be a little software agent that sits on the phone. It will constantly be getting updates from the host site, and it will give the latest signature files and updates to block the known attacks. The 3G phone is actually just another Internet-enabled device. And so you need a similar protection but we have to give it at a smaller size. And we have to cater for a very rapid adoption rate.
The good thing is that the signature file will be very small, so it has a very small footprint. We were challenged by NTT DoCoMo to reduce the size, reduce the size, and reduce the size. Eventually, we will block attacks without signature files. It will be like our IntruShield line of appliances which blocks both known and unknown attacks. With unknown attacks, this can only be done using heuristics (development of programs that use pattern recognition, rather than those based on algorithms).
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