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VistaNet Security Briefing Issued Problems associated with indiscriminate and ill-thought out access to the Internet in the office are becoming fre- quent. In response, VistaNet Ltd has made available a free briefing report: “Rolling the Internet out to the Desktop: the Security Perspective”.

Aimed at managers and systems staff entrusted with provision of office Internet access it covers email, the WWW, software integrity, timewasting, copyright and IPR as well as human resource issues - harassment and use of illegal material, and corporate issues - employees being mindful of how they represent the company via emails etc. For a fkee copy please contact:Vista Net on tel/fax: +44 (0)1223 500 535 /536. Email: [email protected]

ACL Supports Audit Tvends The Vancouver, Canada, based ACL Services Ltd., has adopted a new approach to the support current audit trends. Some four key elements aim to assist clients formulate and implement strategic audit solutions to add value and improve business performance.

First, market leading data enquiry, analysis and reporting software; world- wide support network; audit focussed publications; and finally a complete range of training and consulting services.

These changes have been as a result of key findings from audit technology trends:

. internal auditors plan to continue to employ software to meet changing needs with data analysis/extraction, by a large margin, expected to

inCrease most in importance in the next 3 years

. the role of internal auditors is changing as they employ software to support them in providing more value-added services to management

l 57% of respondents agree that one of the biggest challenges that face in internal audit is learning how to use new software

ACL asserts that is no longer ade- quate to simply be a software supplier - they have to assist clients in the applica- tion of technology and support clients by increasing the value-added services they provide to their organisations. A recent survey revealed that clients need turn-key solutions or total solution approaches.

Firewall Market Continues Impressive Growth r

A new report from Datamonitor shows that while the firewall business is set for further growth, their role is due to change. The report, “InterneMntranet Security: Safeguarding the Path into the Network Age”, estimates a world mar- ket of over $1 bn by 2001 with Europe amounting to $340 m by 2001, see chart.

The report says that there is a clear trend to more granular data security in business which means that the point- products are being subsumed into all- rncc mpassing security solutions together

with growing competition among fire- wall vendors indicating imminent con- solidation.

Firewalls will remain an integral part of security solutions for many businesses but their functions will become broader. They will be integrated in security solu- tions offering end-to-end encryption, single sign-on and single-point manage- ment functionality.

The growth of the firewall market will continue albeit at a slower pace.The main stimulus comes from the arrival of large numbers of small and medium- sized companies into the intranet arena as well as increasing penetration of countries outside the USA.

Regionally, an imbalance will be corrected as players accumulate sales and marketing channels worldwide. Western Europe, which generated 21% of rev- enues in 1996 will contribute 32% of total revenues in 2001. The UK is the largest European market followed by Scandinavia, Germany and France.

Datamonitor asks the question as to whether firewalls are doing the wrong job? It points out that to achieve a high

degree interaction between internal and external communication flows, security solutions need to focus on information security rather than system security.This mandates that in extremis users are allowed to enter all areas on the net- work but the data in fields and databases are always protected and only accessible through strong authentication and authorisation procedures which in turn depend on the roles an individual fulfils in an organisation.

Each piece of data would in effect be protected by a firewall and encryption wherever it resides on the internal or external network. Although the com- plexity of tying every single piece of information in the corporation’s virtual database to every potential user seems overwhelming, this exercise is unavoid- able for businesses wanting to make the most of their information assets whether they use firewalls or any other security system. Contact: Datamonitor Europe,

tellfax: +44 (0)171 625 8548 / 5080.

USA: tel/fax: +l 212 686 7400 /2626.

URL: www.datamonitor.com

0 Computer Audit Update l December 1997 q 0 1997, $17.00 Elsevier Science Ltd.

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