An Ignoble Experiment

2. Enterprises plan to spend $17M on average for data center security this year, says Infonetics

Microsoft's (Nasdaq: MSFT) anti-malware software for Windows 8 and RT, Windows Defender, suffers from a security hole of its own, the company warned in its advanced notice for its monthly Patch Tuesday update being released this week.

The Windows Defender software can be exploited by a hacker to gain elevated privileges on a computer or within a network. This could involve an attacker gaining accessing to a machine as a "user" and elevating privileges to an "administrator," opening up the network to attack.

In addition, Microsoft will patch two "critical" holes in its software, one that affects all versions of Internet Explorer, including IE 10 for Windows 8 and RT, and another that impact the Windows operating system, except for Windows 8, Windows Server 2012 and Windows RT for its Surface tablet.

The security hole in IE could enable an attacker to gain control of an infected computer and network. An infection occurs when a user visits a malicious website.

This update "should be on the top of your patching efforts," Wolfgang Kandek, chief technology officer at security firm Qualys, advised IT managers.

Andrew Storms, director of security operations at security firm nCircle, said the IE patch was most likely a fix for security holes identified at the annual Pwn2Own hacking event held at the CanSecWest conference.

"Historically, Microsoft has always been behind competitors patching Pwn2Own bugs. Even with their new, more aggressive IE patch cadence they're still behind other browsers that don't stick to a monthly patch schedule. This probably isn't a huge problem for enterprise security teams because the bug hasn't been publicly released," Storms said in a statement emailed to FierceEnterpriseCommunications.

At the Pwn2Own contest, the French security firm Vupen won first place and received $100,000 in prize money for "creating and showing the first exploit for Internet Explorer 10 Classic (Desktop) and IE 10 Modern UI (Metro) on Microsoft Surface Pro running a Windows 8 operating system. The exploit fully bypassed all Windows 8 security protections and exploit mitigation technologies," the French security firm said.

Storms concluded: "The number of bulletins isn't the only factor IT security teams consider when they review a patch so, even though the overall patch count is a little higher than average this month and only two of the bulletins merit a critical rating, it's too early to assume it's going to be an easy month."

For more:
- see Microsoft's advanced notice
- read Kandek's blog

Read more about: Microsoft, Security Vulnerabilities
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By Fred Donovan

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4. Enterprise application deals dominated ICT merger activity last year, says IDC

Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO), Intel's (Nasdaq: INTC) McAfee, HP (NYSE: HPQ), Juniper Networks (NYSE: JNPR) and Trend Micro were identified by 104 large enterprises surveyed by Infonetics Research as the top suppliers of data center security products.

Other leading vendors included Fortinet (Nasdaq: FTNT), Check Point (Nasdaq: CHKP), Palo Alto, and Dell SonicWALL (Nasdaq: DELL).

Enterprises spent an average of $14.6 million on data center security products in 2012 and plan to spend close to $17 million in 2013, according to the survey.

Source: Infonetics

The leading drivers for enterprises to buy new data center security products include the need to protect virtualized servers, upgrade security products to match network performance and add new threat protection technologies.

"Based on the results of our latest study, we believe most data center security buyers will continue to turn to trusted names, but they'll also use smaller vendors whose solutions bring a leap in efficacy, lower costs, or provide management and policy functions that offer a single window into hardware appliances, virtual appliances, and server software," observed Jeff Wilson, principal analyst for security at Infonetics.

The research firm predicted that enterprises will continue to use hardware infrastructure for firewalls and to prevent distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, which can shut down networks and websites by flooding them with bogus traffic. At the same time, enterprises will continue to invest in virtual appliances for higher-layer security for messaging, application and Web protection, as well as intrusion prevention.

In addition, Infonetics expects to see continued growth in hypervisor security products and more partnerships between appliance, virtual appliance and server security vendors.

"Now is the time to develop comprehensive solutions. Vendors that aren't in the game yet or rounding out their product offerings will be challenged to compete for the massive dollars that will be spent this year and next," Wilson concluded.

For more:
- see the Infonetics stats

Read more about: Microsoft
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By Fred Donovan

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5. HP's board changes leave Wall Street puzzled

Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in the enterprise applications sector reached $50.5 billion in 2012, the largest portion of the disclosed value of information and communication technology (ICT) merger and acquisitions deals last year, according to research firm IDC.

At the same time, the number of disclosed enterprise application deals declined 11 percent year-over-year in 2012, IDC found.

Although not specified by IDC, one of the largest enterprise application deals of last year was SAP's $4.4 billion acquisition of Ariba, a procurement management software provider for enterprises.

The enterprise application sector bucked the trend for the broader ICT market, which saw a 14.2 percent year-over-year increase in the number of deals to more than 3,800, but a 10.8 percent year-over-year decline in the value of disclosed deals to $211 billion.

The mobile sector was the second-largest portion of ICT M&A value, reaching $40.1 billion in disclosed deals in 2012. More than half of that was made up by Softbank's $20 billion acquisition of Sprint-Nextel (NYSE: S), a deal that has yet to be completed. The telecom sector was third, with $33 billion in deals and Internet deals with $27.5 billion.

Constellation Software, whose main goal is the acquisition of software companies, was the most active acquirer, registering 18 deals that primarily involved its subsidiaries buying firms in vertical application markets. Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) was the second most active acquirer with 17 deals, and Facebook (Nasdaq: FB) was third with 15 deals. Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) and Publicis Groupe tied for fourth with 12 deals each.

"One of the most important opportunities to surface in 2012 was the emergence of the third platform, built on the four pillars of cloud, mobile, big data, and social technologies," said Dan Yachin, research director of emerging technologies for IDC EMEA.

"As companies move to invest more heavily in these technologies for the future, there was a burst of M&A activity as vendors sought to position themselves for this critical shift in the market. IDC tracked 710 deals--18.6 percent of all M&A deals in 2012--associated with the four technologies that constitute the new platform," he added.

The IDC data contrast with figures compiled by Ernst & Young on tech sector 2012 M&A activity. Ernst & Young found that both deal value and volume declined last year, with the cloud and big data sectors topping tech M&A activity last year.

For more:
- see IDC's stats
- check out the SAP-Ariba release
- see Ernst & Young's study

Read more about: cloud, mergers and acquisitions
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By Fred Donovan

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