Five Reasons Why Authentication Still Matters -- and Still Isn't Fixed

Jan 05, 2009, 23:03 (0 Talkback[s])
(Other stories by Jeff Vance)

"5.) Trends like cloud computing will put more information at risk.

"Cloud computing promises to be one of the battlefields where technology titans like Microsoft and Google will compete. It also promises to be a gigantic security risk.

""The biggest problem with cloud computing is identity management," Hollister said. "Once an attacker has used false credentials to get into a network, that person is then considered a trusted user. Any hacker worth his salt can then get through the rest of the network’s defenses in several minutes. In cloud computing, the weakest link is the identity of the dumbest user."

"Every security pro knows that users are the weakest link in any security chain, but with more and more information moving offsite and to the Internet, those weak-link users pose a much bigger risk."

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