Security News > 2004 > June > Experts Call for Raising Awareness About IT Security
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=11§ion=0&article=46429&d=8&m=6&y=2004 M. Ghazanfar Ali Khan Arab News 8 June, 2004 RIYADH, 8 June 2004 - A panel of IT experts say local businesses need multilayer IT security cover because the exponential growth of worms, viruses and spam e-mail have dramatically changed the security landscape in the last two years. They also want to raise awareness about IT security in Saudi Arabia, where poor technical know-how together with lack of awareness could cost businesses dear. The experts were attending a meeting organized by Specialists for Computer Systems (SCS) here on Sunday. SCS says it is a leading provider of IT security products in the Middle East. The company's information security solutions include security awareness for enterprises, security assessments, consultancy, risk management, virus protection, policy compliance management, access control, integrated security solution, security knowledge transfer, intrusion detection system, firewalls, early warning solutions and content filtering. SCS is an enterprise security partner of Symantec, a Microsoft gold certified partner for security solutions, and a Cyber Guard and Citrix Golden partner. It is involved with a number of projects for Saudi government agencies and the private sector. The event was attended by experts from various companies including Muhammad Al-Mandil, SCS president; Esam Daban, vice president; Khalid Siddiqi, SCS marketing manager; Bashar Bashaireh, Cyber Guard manager for Middle East and North Africa; and Hani Hijazi of Citrix. Al-Mandil and Daban said demand for stronger application security and security for wireless networks will drive the growth of the information security services market, as will the continuing trend toward outsourcing network-security functions such as application security testing, disaster recovery and management of network security devices. "In 2002, the global financial impact from virus attacks dropped for the first time in seven years," said Bashar. However, the financial impact of virus attacks has been on the rise again in the recent past. Many factors have contributed to the rising costs, including the reality that many companies are still not prepared to handle the threat from fast-spreading virus attacks. Some studies nonetheless predict more than 20 percent annual growth in spending for information security services. _________________________________________ ISN mailing list Sponsored by: OSVDB.org
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http://www.arabnews.com/?page=11§ion=0&article=46429&d=8&m=6&y=2004