Users are increasingly carrying their iPads, iPhones and Android smartphones into the workplace. These mobile devices and tablets introduce new security threats and IT management challenges.

Join us for the third in our series of webinars to learn about new Cisco innovations that will help you identify the devices, apply policies and enable user management across wired and wireless networks. Featuring special guest speaker Dan Larkin, Director of Strategic Operations for the National Cyber-Forensics and Training Alliance (NCFTA) who will share the new threat vectors introduced due the influx of mobile devices. Take control of your network now.

Live webcast Wednesday, May 4th from 10:00 -- 11am PDT (12:00 -- 1:00pm EDT)
Register now!

Tags: Android, Cisco, iPad, iphone, management, mobile devices, network, security, smartphone, wi-fi, wifi, wireless

This is part of an ongoing series on the National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace.  The introduction to this series can be found here.

A couple of months ago, I spoke with a security researcher at a conference about the NSTIC.  He questioned the need for an intermediary to manage users’ identity information; he asked why we don’t just do this at the user’s endpoint, eliminating the need for the user to trust an external party.  This is a good place to begin a discussion about the NSTIC architecture.

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Tags: NSTIC, NSTIC Series, security

There is a debate raging in the IT industry about the role of the network.

In the same week that a gaming company’s network was hacked and the personal information of 60 million customers was leaked, there is a debate raging about whether the network matters.

In the same moment that the iPad is being adopted by 65% of the Fortune 100 — obliterating conventional wisdom about how corporate networks support consumer devices and mobility —there is a debate raging about whether the network matters.

On one side we have newcomers to the networking industry and some industry commentators who believe that the value of a network should be determined only by the cost of its components.  They argue that customers should focus squarely on acquisition cost, not the value of their network assets.  They argue that customers should focus on capital cost, not network capability and innovation. They believe the network has become a utility; that ‘good’ is good enough.

We all understand that negotiating the best price for goods and services always makes good business sense.  But this debate is about more than that.

The debate is about making a choice between a tactical network where getting the lowest possible price up front is paramount – and a strategic network investment that enables customers to adapt quickly to new business imperatives and to handle the increased demands on their business.

This debate has fueled numerous myths and misperceptions in our industry.  Here are the seven most misleading Myths of the Good Enough Network.

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Tags: good enough, myths, network, QoS, security, tco

Security and functionality have lived on opposite ends of the spectrum since the dawn of time. The door with no lock has always been easier to use than something with multiple chains and dead bolts. Of course, the unlocked door has always been easier to open for those who may want to do bad things.

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Tags: security

A new tool called the Cisco IOS Software Checker is now available on the Cisco Security Intelligence Operations (SIO) portal.  This tool introduces a feature that has been long-requested from our customers and will make Cisco product security information much easier to consume and digest.

Security Advisories that are published by the Cisco Product Security Incident Response Team (PSIRT) provide detailed information about security vulnerabilities in Cisco products, including mitigations, affected products and vulnerable and fixed versions of software. Security Advisories affecting Cisco IOS include a table that provides a list of affected Cisco IOS release trains and fixed versions for those trains. Our customers have long asked us for ways to simplify identification of affected software in this table, and so we have developed the Cisco IOS Software Checker for this very purpose. This tool leverages our internal databases to easily provide affected software information without requiring you to manually process the fixed software table.

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Tags: psirt, security