Jaikumar Vijayan

The increased use of videoconferencing and Internet-collaboration technologies, the rush toward Web services and an emerging class of malicious code that blends virus and wormlike capabilities represent some of the biggest security challenges for 2002, according to analysts.

Forget about major e-commerce build-outs or fancy infrastructure projects with bells and whistles for 2002. The big IT spending of the past few years projects such as Y2k remediation, Web-enabling legacy environments and e-commerce applications is history. Instead, 2002 is shaping up to be a year of hunkering down and consolidating, say IT leaders.

The U.S. government's cybersecurity agency is urging IT managers to ensure that their domain name servers are fully redundant and dispersed at multiple locations in order to avoid potential disruptions to services such as Web browsing, remote access and e-mail.

The U.S. government's cybersecurity agency is urging IT managers to ensure that their domain name servers are fully redundant and dispersed at multiple locations in order to avoid potential disruptions to services such as Web browsing, remote access and e-mail.

Corporations that permit employees to use consumer instant messaging (IM) technologies could be opening up their networks to malicious attacks, users and security experts warn.

Microsoft Corp. last week announced a new system for rating the severity of security holes in its software. But it also urged the security community to exercise better judgment about publicizing software vulnerabilities and detailing how they can be exploited.

Microsoft announced a new system for rating the severity of security holes in its software, but it also urged the security community to exercise better judgment about detailing how software vulnerabilities can be exploited.

IBM Corp. last week boosted its midrange Unix server line-up with new models featuring faster processors and new reliability and management technologies developed under a wide-ranging IBM software development program called eLiza.