So this week is pretty exciting. For the third year in a row, we're going to be showing off a prototype at the DEMO conference. Two years ago we launched Identity Defender (I was part of that one), which went on to become Norton Identity Safe—a technology available today in our award-winning Norton Internet Security and Norton 360 products. Last year our Symantec Research Labs Advanced Concepts group unveiled Project Watchdog, which today is known as Norton Online Family and is currently in public beta. This year...
As municipal Wi-Fi networks begin to roll out, I've begun to notice a trend that isn't surprising, but is still a bit worrisome. Business users are beginning to use the muni Wi-Fi in the office. While the signal doesn't often penetrate too deeply into buildings, conference rooms and window offices seem to get a sufficient signal in many cases. The problem is that I see people using the muni Wi-Fi signal instead of the office IT-supported network. Sometimes they just use it because it's more convenient. The office IT network is "secure" and requires extra work, such as entering keys or using a VPN. Sometimes they do it because they explicitly want to avoid the local IT policy controls (access to restricted sites, use of restricted applications, etc.)
So, why is this a problem? First, it exposes the user’s computer to the Internet without the normal protection of the office IT security safeguards (like a firewall). While it's quite possible to...
