Robert Mullins posted an interesting article this week highlighting the tension between people who warn of impending danger from information security threats …

“Mark Bregman, chief technology officer of security company Symantec … spoke at the first-ever NASA IT Summit and said the space agency is ideally suited to promote global cooperation among nations on cybersecurity. … ‘There’s an urgent need for diplomacy to kick start international cooperation on cybersecurity,’ Bregman said.”

and people who think InfoSec vendors are just fear mongers seeking to sell products …

”comments that followed Montalbano’s story suggested Bregman was hyping the threat for the sake of Symantec sales. “See, Symantec created the panic so as to sell its products,” wrote one. “If Symantec is not the one starting all the cybersecurity mess, the whole world would be much more peaceful,” wrote another.”

As an employee of an vendor of InfoSec software, as a student of the technology of security and as a private citizen concerned about the potential for international terrorism, I tend to side with those who point out our immense vulnerability.  I hope that our technology can help combat the real-world threats that exist.

I hope the world is not lulled to passive inactivity by those who are skeptical of such threats.