ISC Answers the "What" and "Why" Questions about Intrusion Prevention Services (IPS) for Small and Medium Sized Businesses

Intrusion Prevention Services??? Never heard of it. And then the next thought might be … Why do companies need it? The Internet has become critical to us in all aspects of daily lives. That's a fact. And with the convenience of the Internet, comes the increasingly daunting concern over internet fraud, identity theft, medical records getting into the wrong hands, Social Security numbers being breached on computers, military records getting hacked into and a myriad of other woes. Almost daily people read in the headlines of some 12 year old hacking into business computers, compromising financial and personnel records that could cause unlimited damage over the long term.

(PRWEB) February 4, 2007 -- While some of this intrusion might be from disgruntled employees, the vast majority is being done by hackers using random algorithms to shotgun the internet with numeric combinations in the hopes of pinging a live address. These programs create millions of random combinations of numeric addresses in the hopes that they will be able to penetrate an open portal on a firewall.

Many companies mistakenly believe that implementing a firewall will protect them and the corporate data from hacking threats. Good in theory…. But it doesn't work that way. The reason why is that in order to allow corporate communication, data or emails, to leave the corporate Intranet and move into the Internet, a window must be opened in a secure firewall. Think of building a secure wall around a fortress, but then creating an open door from which to leave. And once that portal or door is opened, not only can communications leave, but hackers can come into a company's Intranet.

So, in other words, corporate data is only as secure as the weakest link, and in this case it's an open portal. Maybe the president of the company is reading this and has placed a call to the IT department to check this out. Now that there has been established a potential security problem, what can be done to resolve it?

Intrusion Prevention Services (IPS) resides in front of the firewall, thus preventing hackers from getting through the firewall and finding that open portal. The real issue is why Intrusion Prevention Services are needed.

Intrusion Protection Systems have become a critical factor in the security of company data and communication capability. It is such a critical issue that breaches in data integrity can negatively impact the viability of a company. IPS systems allow companies to benefit from the positive advances in the Internet while negating the negative aspect of network intrusion.

Jack Burlin is the IPS Product Manager with Information Support Systems with his major responsibilities being in research and analysis as well as customer relations. Mr. Burlin's eclectic background includes a BA in Physics and MBA in Marketing as well as having been a T-38 Instructor an A-7 Pilot and an Operations Staff Officer in the United States Air Force. He is also the author of a book entitled "When is a Toilet Like a Salt Shaker?"

Information Support Concepts (ISC, http://www.iscdfw.com) is a company that specializes in providing computer professionals over 2,000 catalogued items for the IT industry. Information Support Concepts markets product solutions nationally and internationally for networking, telecom, corporate training rooms and school computer classrooms since being founded in 1987.

To contact Mr. Burlin and ISC, or call at 800-458-6255

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