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Telecoms giants have agreed to exchange data on their latest security and information breaches as part of an industry coalition to stamp out cyber attacks by using an enhanced automated response system. The Fingerprint Sharing Alliance involves 20 of the largest providers, including Cisco, BT and Asia Netcom who will collectively share cyber attack profiles, or “finger prints” to stop attacks more quickly and quash them closer to the source. Under current industry attempts to cut off cyber crime, network operators use e-mail, phone calls and forums to keep each other informed and develop preventative methods. However, the Alliance favours an enhanced version of software to collect data from devices around the network, which is then correlated to allow service providers to baseline the network and detect any deviations from normal status. In the event of a distributed-denial-of-service-attack, or infection from a worm or botnet, Arbour’s Peakflow SP system will alert members in real-time, without disclosing competitive information. The Alliance is proud to claim that such technology means that this is the first time that companies have been able to share attack profiles automatically, “allowing providers to consistently protect one another and their customers from distributed threats.” Jim Slaby, senior analyst at the Yankee Group, agrees: “There’s nothing like this that effectively lets far-flung network operators have direct, real time information sharing.” Having securely received a fingerprint, the data is used by the upstream ISP to track, analyse and mitigate the attack, thereby removing compromise hosts as near to the ingress as possible. According to data from Cisco Packet magazine, the alliance arrives at a timely juncture, given the fact that 30,000 computers are currently “recruited” every day into botnets. Sandra Boyle of Current Analysis said that network security is a “top concern” and the growth of IP telephony will make the corporate practice even more critical. “This is a step in the right direction to protect public networks; and enterprise customers will welcome the cooperation from network operators,” she said, adding that more shared security schemes would be welcome. The Fingerprint Alliance is understood to be continuing its search for further members to join ranks so a “larger community can be engaged to solve significant threats to the Internet.” Apr 5, 2005 Email this article Printer friendly page Previous Page
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