At the turn of the century I was with a company that was providing websites to it’s clients which included hosting as well. The network we had set up at the time was decent enough but as the business grew considerably over the next two years so did the amount of data and files we had to store on our system. This not only included clients private information but sensitive business data like credit card information and phone numbers as well. This company which no longer exists was soft on Computer Security and though they employed some simple software to keep the basic infections and attacks out it wasn’t enough. This company suffered from a penny pinching CEO who believed the threat of problems was overhyped to sell Network Security applications. It wasn’t to long before I left the company for another opportunity with a more open minded employer. It was a smart move too because my employer eventually got sued for allowing his customers information to be stolen and sold to third parties. This lawsuit forced him to close his doors and pack it in.
My new employer was far more liberal with the company’s money and the IT department had a fairly decent budget. Our CEO/President here also had a background in IT so he had a good sense of direction and understood the needs for extensive Endpoint Security. Unfortunately he was not open to the idea of purchasing new software and so we were stuck with a then five year old application that did little more than offer decent intrusion prevention. These tools really didn’t help us eliminate or even detect threats or infections as the publisher of such software had gone out of business themselves. This left us with an outdated set of definitions and our IT Director was given the task of creating updates himself. My Director was a fantastic programmer so he did this part of the job well but other areas that required attention suffered because of the amount of time he had to spend creating new definitions. Needless to say by the time our President gave in and authorized the purchase of new Computer Network Security the damage had been done to the business and they struggled to keep their heads above water for the next year before finally being bought out by their completion. Luckily for me I had taken a better opportunity and a promotion with a competitor by that time.
The company I’m with now and have been for quite some time also offers websites and hosting but also functions as an email provider as well. It is for this reason along with year of experience at the executive level that we utilize Blink Professional Edition from eEye. Blink is a fantastic piece of Network Security as it not just detects 100% of all infections but it also identifies possible threats and flags them and then keeps them out of the network permanently. The program also gives us the ability to monitor incoming and outgoing traffic and scan it for possible threats as well. The company has been utilizing Blink since before I began my tenure there but I’ve not seen any of the problems I had seen with my former employers. We are free from zero day attacks, phishing attempts, and even spyware and malware don’t pose much of a problem or decimate our resources as I saw them do elsewhere.
Blink is actually offered as a Free Antivirus Software from http://www.eeye.com though its their Personal Edition. The Personal Edition is nothing to scoff out however as it is the most comprehensive security program one can find for personal home, non business related use. Take it from someone who has been using it for over a year. If I really didn’t want to I could probably forego running my daily scans too as Blink Personal’s intrusion prevention is top notch. Home users should take Endpoint Security as seriously as business do because nobody wants to lose their identity or have their files tampered with or even stolen.