Jason Powell - Church IT and Other Musings

Postini Drops Their Pricing ... like Big Major Giant Drop

This is a snippet from Network World ...

" ... The Google Message Filtering service for filtering out spam and e-mail-carried malware costs $3 per user per year. At $12 per user per year, Google Message Security includes Google Message Filtering and added elements such as content-policy management to check for compliance violations.

Google Message Discovery builds off Google Message Security and adds a year of message data archiving, retention and discovery; it costs $25 per user per year for one year of archived data.

"Formerly, this would have been about $100 per user," Petry says. In general, Google is lowering the entry price for its Postini security services from about $30 per user to $3, according to Petry.

Google acquired Postini last year for approximately $625 million. "

GCC is a long time Postini user and lover ... I was excited when Google bought Postini last year and this looks like some of the first fruits from the acquisition.

IT GETS EVEN BETTER! ... Non-profits get a 66% discount on the above pricing!!!

That means the entry filtering service is $1/user/year!!
$4.08/user/year for the middle level service
$8.50/user/year for the highest level service which includes email archival for a year.

We currently pay around $22/user/year for the middle level service for 135 mailboxes ... which I pay happily because Postini rocks.  Now you're telling me I can save a bunch of money AND get message archiving to boot??  Pinch me someone :-)

Several of us are trying to get more info from Postini, you can read the response David got back here.

Hopefully we'll have more info to share during tomorrows podcast ... be there 2pm Eastern.

Microsoft Forefront Security Software hits public beta

The public beta for Microsoft's new security software, Forefront, is now open.  Get it here http://www.microsoft.com/forefront/default.mspx

Microsoft Forefront Client Security delivers unified protection from current and emerging malware, so you can feel confident that your business systems are better protected against a broad range of threats. Through a single agent, Forefront Client Security provides real-time detection and removal of spyware, rootkits, and other emerging threats, as well as traditional attacks such as viruses and worms.

Uber volunteer Dustin said he'll install it for us tonight so we can begin testing.  One app tightly integrated into Active Directory to handle all malware ... sweet!  I'm going to assume that Microsoft will give us charities a nice discount once Forefront comes out of beta ... and thus we'll say farewell to Symantec and Webroot.  Actually, we're already saying goodbye to Webroot Spysweeper and switching to the free Microsoft Defender.  I was planning to dump Symantec in favor of AVG or Sophos next year ... but will now wait to see how Forefront pans out.

For home users I'm still recommending the free AVG anti-virus product and free Microsoft Defender.  I've installed that combo in many many homes and it works great.

I'm sure someone will comment about how macs don't get malware ... so let me just say that once it becomes profitable to infect a mac it will happen.  If/when we get a mac for our dept, I'll be looking for anti-virus software to slap on it.  Which raises a good question ... who are the leading anti-virus providers for the mac platform?

Microsoft Anti-Malware team is blogging

The Microsoft Anti-Malware Engineering Team has started a blog.  From their site...

We're the team responsible for building Microsoft's antivirus and anti-spyware technology (along with anti-rootkit, anti-bot, and other stuff).

These guys created the free Windows Anti-Spyware application which I've been using since it came available back in January on my home PC's.  I've also been putting it on friends and after-hours client PC's...to date no problems with spyware crap.

This team recently announced that Windows Anti-Spyware has just been renamed Windows Defender and is undergoing mods to use the Windows Update technology for updates.  It and Microsoft's anti-virus software will be part of Windows Vista and will also be free for Windows XP users.

Now that's very interesting news...and has to give some 3rd party companies pause.  You mean next year I could switch all my network PC's over to Microsoft's anti-virus and anti-malware products for free??  And their updates will be delivered automatically over the regular old Windows Update technology?  If that is in fact the case I'm smiling!  I just budgeted $3500 for anti-spyware and anti-virus licensing for next year.  For 140 PC's that's really not much, but I'd love to have that money be used for something else.

So kudos to Microsoft for what appears to be yet another positive upcoming change.  I know what you're thinking ... dude, switching your malware apps over to Microsoft is putting all your eggs in one basket.  Obviously we wouldn't make the transition without through testing.  But, given my experience with MS Anti-spyware I've betting the final malware products will be solid.

This team also just released the Windows Live Safety Center (beta).  From the site...

    Windows Live Safety Center is a new, free service designed to help ensure the health of your PC.

        * Check for and remove viruses
        * Learn about threats
        * Improve your PC's performance
        * Get rid of junk on your hard disk

I gave it a whirl on the home PC.  All is well except for my disk needs a major defrag.  Which I already knew.  Problem is I don't have enough free space to defrag!! :-(

Yep, it's about time Microsoft took some proactive measures to help with malware.  Some are claiming it's too late coming and consumer confidence in Windows is shot.  Guess we'll find out over the next couple years.

Firefox users ... you are not immune

Think your protected from spyware 'cause you're using Firefox?  Think again ...

Snippet from an article in The Register:

Some useful citizen has created an installer that will nail IE with spyware, even if a surfer is using Firefox (or another alternative browser) or has blocked access to the malicious site in IE beforehand. The technique allows a raft of spyware to be served up to Windows users in spite of any security measures that might be in place. (full story)

There are some very clever and radically determined people out there ... humans are soo funny :-)

Spyware profits

Spyware UPDATE:  The Register just posted a very interesting article on spyware.  Check this out:  It's now estimated that "the illicit advertising market underpinned by adware infection of home and business PCs could be worth up to $1.6 billion a year."  Yes, billion with a "B"!!!  Hmm, think that has something to do with the continued increase of spyware?  Even if that stat is off by half...that's some crazy $ being made while, at the same time, bringing unprotected PC's to their knees.

Here's how we're managing spyware at GCC if you haven't already read it.

SpySweeper ... 2 thumbs up!

I read another article today about the fact that spyware has surpassed viruses in terms of computer disruption and it will only continue to get worse.  The article went on to say that if you haven't looked at an enterprise anti-spyware solution you'd better get started.  Been there...done that.

Back in October I got tired of combating spyware and started researching enterprise solutions.  Webroot's SpySweeper Enterprise Edition had won several awards so I downloaded the 30 day trial...tested it a few days on my workstation...then pushed it out to all our computers (80 units at that time) via a simple group policy.  After a day or 2 our support calls drop to nil.  After the trial was up I was sold on the product and got a great end-of-year discount by doing a little negotiating with the vendor.  Since October we haven't had a single spyware related issue and since all the updates are automated by the SpySweeper admin console, the only time I even think about spyware is when I read about it in an article...or someone wants to know why their home PC is jacked up. 

When I think about all the IT changes we made in 2004...and we made a ton...I think SpySweeper may have had the largest impact.  The ROI from this simple solution has been HUGE ... allowing us to focus on important stuff rather than fighting spyware.  If you're managing a network, small or large, I'd strongly recommend you check out SpySweeper...it rocks!

I wrote a more detailed version of this post a while back in this techrepublic.com forum.

Of course for the home user I still use/recommend these free tools ... AdAware, Spybot, MS Anti-spyware ... and the best step-by-step "how to remove spyware" article I've found is here at majorgeeks.com.