IT-Toolkits.com
The IT-ToolKits.com website is a resource site for Information Technology management. This site contains the tools that the CIO, CSO, and CFO can use for Sarbanes Oxley, Disaster Recovery, Security, Job Descriptions, IT Service Management, Change Control, Help Desk, Service Requests, SLAs - Service Level Agreements, and Metrics.
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Contact Centers Are Key to the Implementation of SOA
Contact center managers, personnel and infrastructure have
important roles to play as businesses make the transition from legacy systems to
SOA-conformant architectures. Contact centers are where the bulk of real-time,
telephone-based communications and transactions are carried
out. It is also the place that has historically defined and implemented best practices for customer care and self-service.Successful enterprises have tied metrics to help them facilitate their transformation to SOA architectures from legacy architectures.
Thu, 01 Mar 2007 15:29:26 -0700 -
Leahy privacy bill: coddling the criminals?
(Network World) -- After the data breach about a year ago that exposed the personal information of some congressmen, I was sure that there would soon be a federal bill enhancing privacy protections (See Privacy: A personal touch ).But that was not to be.
I guess the big companies that make a profit by violating your and my personal space have enough clout on Capital Hill to even get a congressman whose data was exposed to back off. When the election changed the power picture in Washington, D.C., I had a little burst of hope that something meaningful would happen in this space, but I'm mostly disappointed in what the change has actually brought.
In early February, Senators Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) introduced the "Personal Data Privacy and Security Act Of 2007" (PDF format).
From the press release and a quick read of the proposed legislation, it looks quite good. Even in a more detailed reading the bill has some good stuff in it, but in the end the bill does more to protect the people who are sloppy with your data than have any real teeth to prevent the sloppiness in the first place.
Fri, 23 Feb 2007 13:26:28 -0700 -
Texas, Minnesota eye move to ODF
(IDG News Service) -- Texas and Minnesota may become the second and third U.S. states to adopt Open Document Format for Office Applications (ODF) as the standard file format for government documents instead of the file format that Microsoft Corp. uses in its Office 2007 software suite.
Bills up for legislative consideration in each state propose to mandate the use of an open, XML-based file format that is "interoperable among diverse internal and external platforms and applications; fully published and available royalty-free; implemented by multiple vendors; and controlled by an open industry organization with a well-defined inclusive process for evolution of the standard," according to the Minnesota Senate bill, which can be found here.
One of the versions of the Texas bill, which can be found here, uses similar wording to describe the file format the states intend to support.
The Minnesota bill proposes that the mandate would take effect beginning July 1, 2008, while the Texas bill gives the state's Department of Information Resources until Sept. 1, 2008, to develop a plan for the transition.
Though the bills do not specifically name ODF as the document format under consideration, the explanation of what each state wants to move to seems to fit the standard. ODF is an industry standard supported by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). It is available for free and supported by several vendors in their office suites, including IBM, Sun Microsystems Inc. and Google Inc.
Wed, 07 Feb 2007 16:08:41 -0700 -
ISO 17799 Compliant Disaster Recovery Plan Template Released
The ISO 17799 compliant Disaster Recovery Planning (Business Continuity) Template is Version 4.2. The template has increased in size from 140 pages in version 3.1 to 189 pages in the current version.
Sat, 27 Jan 2007 13:43:09 -0700 -
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Compatibility Concerns Hinder Vista Up
(eWeek Channel Insider) - Microsoft's new operating system may be the most eagerly anticipated release of the past 10 years, but concerns over compatibility, bugs and security are keeping many IT professionals from doing so soon, according to the survey released Jan. 23 by Cambridge, Mass.-based Bit9, a provider of desktop lockdown solutions. Only 68 percent of IT pros reported that they'd be upgrading to Vista in 2007, though very few had made immediate plans. Of those who had expressed their intention to shift to the new operating system, 58 percent said they'd be waiting six months to one year after the launch to do so, while but 10 percent planned to roll out the upgrade in the next six months. Concerns over software compatibility were expressed by 38 percent of the tech professionals, followed by hardware compatibility concerns (17 percent), a desire to wait for bugs to work themselves out (7 percent) and security concerns (6 percent). Fifty-nine percent cited improved security, 44 percent noted "a desire to use the latest and greatest technology" and 29 percent of IT professionals said enforcing compliance is among the features that would lure them to upgrade. While improved security was considered a plus, it was also a concern for IT professionals, uncertain if they would adopt User Access Control, a highly discussed feature of Vista limiting the ability of users and software to damage the computing environment. Eighty-one percent say they were unsure they would use it, 14 percent said they intended to, and 4 percent said they would not. Of those who said they'd implement the feature, nearly 70 percent said they'd provide administrative rights to IT, making exceptions for software developers (35 percent) and non-IT executives (34 percent). Only 7 percent of those surveyed felt "completely" comfortable with Microsoft's client security. Forty-two percent preferred alternative offerings, but would evaluate Microsoft; 17 percent say they would "never" feel comfortable totally relying on Microsoft for security.
Thu, 25 Jan 2007 14:52:38 -0700 -
IT is critical to business continuity. So why haven't more organizations started planning?
(Computerworld) -- Monday morning, 9 a.m. The CEO calls you into an executive meeting as word comes that a full-blown H5N1 avian influenza pandemic is spreading rapidly from central Asia. Your job: Keep mission-critical IT systems working despite staff absenteeism rates that could reach 40% at the height of the pandemic, which is expected to run its course over a period of six to eight weeks.
Supply chain disruptions are expected as countries close their borders, so you can not count on spare parts. With emergency travel restrictions in effect, you can forget about moving staffers between global locations to cope with labor shortages. You also need to enable remote access for an unprecedented number of employees who will either be out sick, caring for ill family members or afraid to come to the office. You have weeks, possibly just days, before the outbreak overtakes one of your major data centers.
Are You Ready?
For many businesses, the answer is probably no.
Sat, 13 Jan 2007 16:10:59 -0700 -
2007 IT Salary Survey Released by Janco
The 2007 IT Salary Survey has just been released by Janco. The some of the summary results are:
Benchmark 4th Quartile
Prior Mean
Current Mean
Prior
Current
Percent Change
Base
Total
Base
Total
Percent Change
Executives
$195,667
$197,766
1.09%
$125,662
$140,550
$128,010
$143,243
1.92%
Middle Managers
$100,182
$101,969
1.78%
$74,976
$78,858
$76,441
$80,527
2.14%
Staff
$94,216
$94,958
0.79%
$63,009
$66,174
$63,570
$66,939
1.16%
Large Enterprise
$109,415
$110,803
1.27%
$76,143
$81,078
$77,333
$82,498
1.75%
Executives
$189,745
$195,144
2.85%
$114,006
$128,464
$113,251
$127,439
-0.80%
Middle Managers
$103,005
$104,764
1.71%
$70,271
$74,978
$70,177
$74,076
-1.20%
Staff
$87,545
$89,639
2.39%
$57,330
$59,727
$58,120
$60,303
0.96%
Mid-Size Enterprises
$107,134
$109,484
2.19%
$70,168
$75,096
$70,367
$74,806
-0.39%
IT Averages All
$108,274
$110,143
1.73%
$73,155
$78,087
$73,850
$78,652
0.72%
A free copy of the summary results are available at
http://www.it-toolkits.com/Salary.htm
Thu, 04 Jan 2007 10:23:36 -0700 -
ISO 17799 Security Manual Template Released
The ISO 17799 Security Manual Template has just been released by Janco. The Template is over 200 pages long and is compliant with:
ISO 17799 Standard
Sarbanes Oxley
HIPAA
Partriot Act
Sensitive Information regulaitions of New York and California
Fri, 22 Dec 2006 12:11:41 -0700 -
Security Expertise Shortage
(eWeek) Businesses are increasingly being put at risk of failing compliance audits and struggling with other security-related efforts, as demand for employees capable of managing such projects is outpacing the supply of qualified candidates.According to a new research report published by the Department of Management at the LSE (London School of Economics) and sponsored by security software maker McAfee, businesses worldwide are reaching a "compliance breaking point" as an increasing number of regulations make it harder for them to stay ahead of auditors.
Mon, 18 Dec 2006 18:02:48 -0700 -
Microsoft fights off 100,000 attacks per month
(Computerworld) -- Microsoft Corp. has long encouraged its employees to "RAS" into the corporate network from home or from the road to access e-mail, shared files and applications.
RAS, short for Remote Access Services, is an old Microsoft term for what most people now call a client VPN.
Microsoft, of course, maintains valuable intellectual property on its internal network, including the source code to all its operating systems and applications. These are constant targets for hackers, and Microsoft tries to protect its most valuable assets with defenses in depth; they are behind firewalls and on networks segmented with IPsec. In addition, the entire network is monitored for suspicious activity, scanned for malware and so on.
What do I mean by a constant target? Last year, Microsoft IT said it was the target of more than 100,000 intrusion attempts per month. Currently, Microsoft filters out about 9 million spam and virus e-mails a day out of 10 million received. Yes, that means that roughly 90% of incoming e-mails are spam.
In that environment, you'd think that VPN connections might expose Microsoft to serious security risks. So how does Microsoft mitigate those risks while continuing to offer VPN access to remote employees and contractors? The answer to that is manifold.
Two-factor authentication
The first layer of protection for the Microsoft VPN is two-factor authentication. After an infamous incident in fall 2000, Microsoft installed a certificate-based public-key infrastructure and rolled out smart cards to all employees and contractors with remote access to the network and individuals with elevated access accounts such as domain administrators.
Sun, 10 Dec 2006 16:59:22 -0700 -
Disaster recovery site puts terrorist bulls-eye on Pa.
(Computerworld) -- The only thing missing from the news clips of the governor flying Wall Street muckety-mucks in a helicopter for a private tour of the facility was a big target painted on top of the facility.Even better, this is a quote that came out of the story The Boston Globe ran on it: I think we are so close today that maybe the trigger is already pulled and the first shot is being fired," said state Rep. John Siptroth (D-Monroe), a prime backer of the Wall Street West concept. Are you kidding me?
I have no issue with the state of Pennsylvania building such a facility. I have no issue with them trying to fill it up. I have a huge issue with the fact that they were on TV flaunting the fact that they were trying to get Wall Street to agree to use their site for disaster recovery. What is the next move? Perhaps we could fly a Blackhawk with a bunch of generals in it from the Pentagon and persuade them to use the facility too? All on camera, of course.
The only mistake the terrorists made tactically by attempting to derail the U.S. financial systems by crashing hijacked airplanes into the World Trade Center was not having the second plane hit in Jersey City, where the financial services companies disaster recovery sites were. Do you really think they would make that mistake again? Do we really need to advertise exactly where to strike if they want to bring the worlds capital markets to their knees?
Thu, 30 Nov 2006 13:48:06 -0700 -
Is Open Source open Source?
(zdnet) The next time you see the phrase open source used in association with some software, be advised that you'll need to take that claim with a grain of salt. That's because beauty (what qualifies as open source) is now apparently in the eyes of the beholder rather than the eyes of the Open Source Initiative the supposed keeper of the official definition of "open source" and the consortium to which open source license authors typically turn to have their licenses ratified as adhering to that definition. The result? A collection of new licenses (and software licensed under them) are turning up that claim to be open source licenses. But according to the OSI's official list of approved licenses, they are nothing of the sort. Even worse, some of these licenses aren't up for consideration. The discrepancy raises three important questions:
- What right do the authors of these licenses have to say that they are open source licenses when they are not on the OSI's approved list?
- What right do software companies have to say that software licensed under these unapproved licenses is open source software?
- Why is the OSI so weak that it can't put it's foot down, and keep the public informed of what's going on? (The OSI is very aware of the situation.)
Mon, 27 Nov 2006 10:46:37 -0700 -
Server market picks up a bit
(ZDNet) The server market grew in the third quarter, despite pressure coming from low prices and virtualization software.
Revenue in the server market grew by 3.5 percent worldwide in the third quarter, coming to $12.9 billion, according to IDC. That's the largest growth spurt in four quarters and the largest third-quarter increase since 2000, when the tech-buying binge of the dot-com days was in its final throes.
Server blades were one of the primary drivers of growth, though at $738 million, blades still represent only a fraction of the overall market. Blade revenue shot up nearly 30 percent in the third quarter while unit shipments of blade servers went up about 25 percent. Revenue from high-end servers grew by 9 percent. Revenue from low-end servers, however, only grew by 3.8 percent, while mid-range server revenue declined by 2.3 percent.
For the past several quarters, server revenue across the industry has been somewhat flat. Prices continue to drop on hardware, forcing server makers to sell more hardware just to stay even. Meanwhile, virtualization software, enabling IT managers to run two or more operating systems on the same server, has eroded demand for more new boxes.
Wed, 22 Nov 2006 09:59:24 -0700 -
Fraud concerns lead to reissue of debit cards
(Computerworld) -- The number of banks and credit unions concerned about a security breach at Wesco Inc., a Muskegon, Mich.-based convenience store chain, is growing.Fifth Third Bancorp today confirmed that it is reissuing debit cards to a limited number of customers in Michigan because of fraud concerns. Letters to the affected customers started going out on Tuesday.
A spokeswoman for the bank said the move was precautionary, not a response to any actual cases of fraud.
We were notified by MasterCard of a number of cards being potentially compromised by a security breach at a retailer, said Stephanie Honan, a spokeswoman for the Cincinnati-based bank, which manages over $105 billion in assets. We put those cards through our monitoring system, and we felt that we should reissue them. We were not forced to reissue them because of any actual fraud, she said.
Honan refused to disclose how many cards were being blocked and reissued, though a local media report pegged the number in the thousands.
Thu, 16 Nov 2006 16:49:57 -0700 -
IT Infrastructure, Strategy, & Charter Template -- CIO Jump Start
The IT Infrastructure, Strategy, and Charter Template
is an essential strategic advantage for an IT team. It drives the
implemetation of a cost effective IT Infrastructure that aligns with an
organization's business strategy is essential to ensuring the success of the
Information Technology function. For many IT professionals, the amount of time
it takes to develop and implement such a infrastructure, and the unknown process
required to complete it, makes infrastructure design and implementation a
daunting task. The IT Infrastructure, Strategy, and Charter Template draws
on the experiences of some of the best IT and business operations executives in
the industry to provide you with the right shortcuts.
Sat, 11 Nov 2006 14:05:37 -0700
