Virtual Machine Security by McAfee

Virtualization is the way of the future and many security companies have noticed that, and consequently designed special softwares to protect virtual machines. Yesterday, McAfee had announced that their products can secure virtual environments and also that they are working together with their partners on what they call "innovative security offerings for virtual machines". I can't help wondering what they will come up with! See more about how they regard virtualization, here!

"Virtualization is the most disruptive technology the security industry has seen in the last 20 years," said George Heron, vice president and chief scientist for McAfee. "We are developing security capabilities for virtualization that are far beyond what is available today." I guess that can only bring joy to CISOs and the rest of the IT department, but I sure hope that the new security measures aren't going to make working on a computer harder than it is for some. "Virtual machines must be secured," said David DeWalt, president and chief executive officer of McAfee. "Virtualization is causing a splash in enterprises because it promises hardware consolidation and cost reductions. However, with the rush to reap those benefits, security often becomes an afterthought. McAfee offers real security for virtual environments."

And there are facts that come to support this statement. I don't know how many of you are actually fans of InformationWeek, but they had a survey just a while ago. It was intended for IT pros and the question was if they had policies regarding the security of virtual machines. The alarming fact is that only 12% provided an affirmative answer. It's nice to see that Mister DeWalt isn't just throwing facts that don't exist at us, but it's sad to know that he's actually right. This fact just brings us to an older problem, and by that I'm referring to the user insecurity vs. hacker skills issue. It's no wonder a lot of hacks occur if there still are unprotected machines.