Q&A with Amit Nath, Country Head - Trend Micro
IT News Online Staff
2009-01-31
What are the main challenges of securing your PC? What should an SMB or SOHO (Small Office Home User) be aware about?
The Internet has new threats being launched daily. Internet predators are growing with each passing day and attacking our device connected to it via email, web and instant messenger. Increased attacks in various and unique forms are seen on all three with each passing day, for example viruses can be designed as a credible site and the user can fall into their traps.
Cyber crime has become a flourishing business and 2009 will be worse than 2008. Cyber crime is finance motivated, it is said that the underground economy is over $7 billion. Let's face the fact, the Internet is where the money resides. So 2009 is going to see more of info-stealing malware, geared towards stealing login credentials, credit card information and more.
The Digital world has become an intrinsic part of our life, be it to be connected to team members in the office or to do our own personal activity, be it ecommerce like shopping for movie tickets or buying travel tickets or paying utility bills or even going to social networking sites. India also has users using online banking facilities too. Doing all of the above mentioned makes the PC extremely vulnerable to attacks, leading to loss or stealing of data and information.
When it comes to vulnerabilities, which ones are usually seen and what form do they come in?
In the past, so long as people did not visit pornography web sites or download unknown documents, they were pretty safe from computer viruses. However, in today's time and age, viruses can be disguised in many forms and propagated to all corners of the world wide web, including many web sites that appear to be authentic.
How aware, in your opinion, are Indian consumers about securing their computers?
Consumers in India is are very smart and we are seeing increased use of broadband and activities online. A recent report printed by IMAI also stated that the rural market has seen 3.3 million broadband users. Having said that, a lot of users overlook or ignore investing in security software thinking or assuming that they would not get attacked, not realizing that all connected to the Internet are prone to attacks.
Trend Micro, we are aware, is an enterprise security software provider, please tell us about the consumer security software provided for SMB and SOHO segment?
When Trend Micro launched the 2009 version of its range of products (AntiVirus, Internet Security, Internet Security Pro), it did a marker survey, examining user habits and needs, to provide consumers with easier and more wholesome protection.
For instance, while using search engines, there will an alert in red or green next to the web page's link to inform users of the level of safety in using or browsing the web site. These softwares can also help to analyze whether the emails you received are safe. The new versions also strengthen protection for social networking sites, by having color indicators to reveal malicious web links sent out under your contacts' names.
What is the added feature that comes in the Consumer security software package and why do you think there is a need for this?
SMB and SOHO users are likely to have more than one person using one PC and each user may have different requirements.
Internet crimes are increasing by the day, and is prevalent in almost all areas now. Especially with the increased uptake of Internet usage, users of the Internet no longer consist of the working executives, but include the elderly and children at home as well.
Although children use the Internet at home for their homework, chat with friends, play games and watch animations, they are seldom aware of the potential threats when they are using the Internet. They can be said to be an extremely vulnerable group.
In the past children could be told not to open the door to strangers and don't pick up their calls. But now, predators can appear in other forms in the world wide web, and employ various methods to ask you questions and gather your personal information to engage in all sorts of illegal activities. All this makes it challenging for parents to physically intervene at all times. However, the Advanced Parental Control solution, which comes embedded in Trend Micro Internet Security 2009 can be an easy answer to it.
So tell us more about parental control feature from Trend Micro
- Limited Internet access by time of day, day of week that would show a reminding pop-up five minutes before one's Internet access time is up. This way the parents can control the time the child sits on the PC for.
- Block the sites parents do not want their child to access. This can be done by age level of the child. Trend Micro Internet Security Software solution comes with four pre set categories - Child, Teenager, Adult and None. Parents can choose from these categories or customize it to their desire, which could mean blocking gaming, gambling, social networking or any sites they would want to.
- Prevents accidental leakage of private information, which means the software prevents the child from revealing personal information via the web, inter messaging tools and the email. The child may enter the phone number or address or credit card number which in turn would be all garbled and not understood by the receiver.
Does Parental Control solution come in the security software package or it needs to bought separately and added?
Yes, it comes embedded with the Trend Micro Internet Security package - TM Internet Security
Who else is selling/offering something similar?
Currently there is only Trend Micro Internet Security Software that provides end-to-end, detailed and intuitive advanced parental control.
Cost and availability - How can it bought and how much is it for?
Cost: Trend Micro Internet Security - 1 year - 3 user license - retail price Rs. 2,000/-
Can be bought online from http://apac.trendmicro.com/apac/purchase/ consumer/reseller/india/index.html and from January end it will be available in retail stores.
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