Security Focus Sharpens

Security vendors and solution providers agree that the war with Iraq will heighten IT security awareness in the United States, just as the Sept. 11 attacks raised the nation's state of alert.

"It's going to put more emphasis once again on security and the need for security," said Jerry Ungerman, president of Check Point Software Technologies, Redwood City, Calif.

Though some politicians overuse the term cyberterrorism, it is a potential implication of the war, Ungerman said. "This just amplifies the potential issues that people will be confronted with. Have they invested and put in place the right security architecture to deal with any potential threats?" he said.

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>>%A0'We're not counting on [the war] to have any major effect,' says Icons' Paul Rohmeyer.
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But security solution providers were divided on whether the increased attention will translate into actual security spending.

Jonathan Gossels, president of SystemExperts, a Sudbury, Mass.-based security consulting firm, said organizations have shown greater awareness of the need for security since Sept. 11, as well as a willingness to buy the necessary solutions. "Security is continuing to get an increased portion of IT dollars," he said, adding that the war will serve as another milestone in the trend toward increased security awareness and spending.

Yet Paul Rohmeyer, COO of Icons, a North Brunswick, N.J.-based security consulting firm, said he doesn't expect the war to spur security spending. "We're not counting on it to have any major effect. If there is any effect, maybe it's removing uncertainty from the market, and that's a good thing," Rohmeyer said. Sept. 11 raised security awareness but didn't produce an increase in spending, he said.

Likewise, Ron Segal, president of Fairfax, Va.-based solution provider Spectrum Systems, said he expects the war to have little impact on IT security spending.

"Awareness is way, way up, but with government and commercial [clients] we find a lot of security upgrades come about the same time as IT upgrades," he said. "And hardly anyone is investing in major IT upgrades these days."

While the Department of Homeland Security has a lot of funding, most of its agencies have frozen budgets for IT upgrades, pending the publication of overall guidelines, Segal said. Most of their current spending is on physical security, he added.