Editor's Corner

Table of Contents

Bandwidth is a publication of Akibia Netowrk & Security Solutions

©2006 Akibia, Inc.
All rights reserved

At the start of a new year, plans are created, budgets are at their full potential, and employees are ready for a new challenge. If you've been in IT for any length of time, this is the early part of your yearly life cycle. You're prioritizing projects and technologies from a number of standpoints. What needs to be secured, where can we gain new efficiencies, is it time to take advantage of improved technologies, can we enhance how we protect our assets, what can we retire?

Like our customers, Akibia looks forward to a fresh start in January. Throughout 2005 we were inundated with solutions vying to solve the "critical" security needs of the enterprise. Always interested in finding solutions to improve our customers' security programs, we screened and evaluated numerous solutions in 2005. In the process it was rare to find a "best solution" within a category. For many technologies, core features and benefits were so similar that differentiation came down to a small set of features. As we looked ahead to 2006, we realized that we would continue to be presented with these same challenges and complexities.

Our first resolution for 2006 was to find a better way to prioritize our resources in response to the deluge of solutions in the marketplace. So in the latter part of 2005, we created a new framework to guide our development efforts. Akibia launched this initiative to organize our activities around several technology sectors (see the accompanying article on page 3). These sectors will help us prioritize our research, provide a broader context for applying our results with the goal of helping us translate our decisions into actions that can be tested, validated and refined. Another tangible result of this effort is our online network map (introduced in the article on the back cover) that will be launched in early 2006.

As we apply this framework to our development initiatives in 2006 we will work on ways to share our experiences and results. Our goal is to apply our proven best practices in a systematic method that will yield high-value results for IT security professionals.

We invite your comments about the articles in this issue and suggestions on what you would like to read about in future editions. Please contact us at bandwidth@akibia.com.

FEATURED IN THIS ISSUE

Kenneth M. Smith, Principal Security Consultant, Akibia
Kenneth Smith joined Akibia in 1996 and was responsible for developing Akibia's Vulnerability Assessment offerings. Mr. Smith is an expert in Information Security including testing, controls and countermeasures. He is the author of a variety of industry publications and holds a CISSP certification from ISC2 and a GCIH Incident Handling Certification from SANS.

Marc Willebeek-LeMair, PhD, Chief Technology Officer, 3Com Corporation
Dr. Willebeek-LeMair is an expert on network systems and security, speaking frequently on the topic of security specific processors on an international basis. Having received his doctorate in electrical engineering from Cornell University, he has over 10 patents and has published more than 50 articles. Prior to 3Com, he was chief technology officer for TippingPoint.

Jane Goh, Product Marketing Manager, Check Point Software Technologies
Jane Goh specializes in security management and has expertise in Check Point's security management product lines including SmartCenter, Eventia and Provider-1. Prior to joining Check Point, Ms. Goh held various product marketing and product management roles at companies including VeriSign, Sun Microsystems, SGI and Securify.

Keerti Melkote, Co-Founder and Vice President of Marketing, Aruba Networks
Keerti Melkote is one of the two original founders of Aruba Wireless Networks. As VP of Product Management and Marketing, Mr. Melkote oversees all aspects of Aruba's intelligent wireless LAN switching system as well as all underlying technology. Mr. Melkote previously held senior management positions at Tahoe Networks and Shasta/Nortel Networks.