Expert Offers Tips on Cyber Security

By Cara Baruzzi

Despite spending “too much” on Internet security measures, most business owners feel increasingly vulnerable to hacking and outside attacks, according to Ed Amoroso, AT&T Inc.’s chief information security officer.

Business owners need to change their approach to Internet and computer system security, Amoroso said. Traditionally, businesses, like consumers who use computers at home, have relied on software to combat everything from spam to hacking, but an overdependence on software actually is a big part of the problem, he added.

“Software is a fundamental issue,” Amoroso said, because most is flawed in some way, making businesses susceptible to outside intrusions. “I’ve never seen software that isn’t broken; there’s probably no such thing. We live in a world where most of the software that’s running around is probably unnecessary and probably broken.”

Therefore, he urged computer users to seek out more efficient software programs and use fewer of them, to cut down on the number of flaws in the system.

Companies also should change their approach to managing the spam, or junk e-mail, they receive in corporate e-mail accounts, Amoroso said. In many cases, each company blocks or deletes spam once it has arrived on the business’ network. But Internet carriers such as AT&T are beginning to offer services that shift that burden off companies. About a year ago, for example, AT&T started giving business customers the option of having AT&T filter and dispose of spam e-mail before it ever makes its way to the company’s network.

Along those lines, AT&T also is developing software that monitors employees’ e-mail habits — how often they check their inbox, how much time they spend doing it, which messages they delete — and, over time, adapts to meet their preferences. The software could, for example, automatically suggest to a user to delete certain e-mails without reading them because they resemble previous e-mails the user discarded. But while AT&T is introducing certain new software aimed at simplifying operations, Amoroso maintained that, overall, businesses need to decrease their dependence on software if they want to boost security.

(c) 2007 Buffalo News. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.