Re: Security stakes raised

[cult hero <jericho () ATTRITION ORG>]

> http://www.infoworld.com/articles/hn/xml/00/06/05/000605hnmicrosecurity.xml

> ORLANDO, FLA. - Microsoft is developing a security server that provides
> firewall and caching services for Windows 2000 users, a company official
> disclosed Monday at a briefing session during TechEd.

> The product, not-yet-officially-announced and called the Internet
> Security and Acceleration (ISA) Server 2000, will soon be available in
> beta version for download at the company's Web site, said Keren Master,
> group program manager of the ISA Server team at Microsoft. The ISA
> Server could be announced as soon as Tuesday, Master suggested.  "Watch
> for the news tomorrow," she said at the beginning of the briefing.

> The ISA Server's firewall functionality will allow network managers to
> protect company data from outside intruders by controlling access and
> traffic, Master said. Its caching features will let companies store
> frequently accessed Web pages locally and thus increase Internet
> browsing speed for users, reduce traffic on the network, and lower
> workload stress on Web servers, she said.

> The product also comes with a management and administration console and
> supports a variety of protocols, such as HTTP (Hypertext Transfer
> Protocol), SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol), and streaming media,
> Master said. It also supports integration of VPNs (virtual private
> networks).

This is all extremely curious.. I can't tell if Microsoft is committed to
security, or not. I wonder how their new SOAP protocol will work in
conjunction with this too.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/periodic/period00/soap.htm

  Remote objects can give a program almost unlimited power over the
  Internet, but most firewalls block non-HTTP requests. SOAP, an XML-based
  protocol, gets around this limitation to provide intraprocess
  communication across machines.

  Currently, developers struggle to make their distributed applications
  work across the Internet when firewalls get in the way.


So according to microsoft, things like firewalls "get in the way", yet
they come up with their own security solutions that by their own argument,
will likely "just get in the way".

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