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Let's start with phishing. For those that don't know, phishing is replicating a legitimate Web site and using it to collect password or credit information. (PayPal seems like a favorite target.) The Anti-Phishing Working Group just reported that the cumulative number of phishing expeditions more than tripled between May and July this year.
Nearly 5 percent of visitors succumb to the fraud and just volunteer personal information. Worse yet, Amit Yoran, director of the national Cyber Security Division of the Department of Homeland Security, just resigned because he didn't believe that the government saw cybersecurity as a significant-enough priority.
My view is that most enterprises don't take it seriously enough, either. (At Sun Microsystems, our chief information officer used to be the CIO at the Pentagon. We take it that seriously.)
What are you doing about it?
If you're not scared yet, take your worst security breach from last year and imagine that the perps had rehearsed for a year--because that's what is going on. Measure that fear against the fear of inconveniencing your users with a basic "something you have, something you know" access policy for buildings and networks alike. On average, 30 percent of your former employees still have access to internal systems. That's the industry average. Scary? What are you doing about it?
Why the difference? Handsets are secure and convenient. Most of the others--the PCs--aren't. They're still secured largely with a password. And they're still devices that can be readily stolen with their information intact--whether from the FBI or your kitchen counter. Lose your laptop, lose your data. Unsecured. It's time you started to look at PCs like the telecommunications companies look at handsets. Not as tools, but as the keys to your house. Don't let your house become haunted.
Litigation gone awry Spurious patent litigation was a problem well before Sun settled with Kodak. It's been going on for years, and lately, it's steadily gotten much worse. Intellectual property is the foundation of global economies, and legitimate patents are crucial cauldrons in which sweat, brains and dollars can create value. Companies that acquire (often questionable) patents and later wield them against new market participants unleash a destructive force that stifles innovation and prevents participation--the polar opposite of the purpose for which patents were created.
Everybody suffers from the abuse of the judicial system and the detritus strewn around the market by spurious patent suits. My view is that we issue patents too freely, without sufficient regard to prior art or triviality. We need to raise the threshold for patent approval to prevent abuse of the system. This would ensure that we're safeguarding incentives and rewards for invention while reducing the legions of bad actors stifling competition.
America is at risk of letting cobwebs in our patent system ensnare real innovation, siphoning energy and effort that could otherwise be directed at progress for the planet while the bloodsuckers drain resources.
Sensationalizing RFID My cat has a radio frequency identification (RFID) tag embedded between her shoulder blades. So if she gets lost, she can be easily identified. If she were hurt, her medical records could be readily retrieved. Imagine the conversation I had with my child's pediatrician when I inquired about the same safety net for my toddler. "YOU WANT TO DO WHAT?" Not a good visit. Talk about feeling like I had fangs. And meanwhile, some groups are protesting its usage on boxes of detergent.
Consumer protection groups and government officials are rightly examining every facet of the issue, but let's not allow irrational fears to impede progress. The network is pervasive. Your usage of that network should be voluntary and subject to explicit and well-communicated privacy policies. But you should have the choice.
Underestimating the future Bandwidth has truly commoditized. It's available everywhere I travel in the world. And it's being used by an extraordinary diverse group of people for an equally extraordinary diversity of applications. The scary part?
No one has enough bandwidth. No one is happy with their network coverage. No one has watched their last digital movie, listened to their last digital audio file, shot their last or highest-resolution digital image or movie. No one has said, "I've had enough. No more bandwidth or network services."
Why is that scary? Just think how large this market is going to become. The biggest companies in the world are those that successfully serve (get this) commodity markets. And from where I sit, having competitive advantages, a balance sheet to fund some truly disruptive business models, and a market looking for competition--I'm terrified at how large the opportunity is. Are we prepared? Are you?
This is a market that's available to us all if we can get through the things that go bump on the Net: the well-costumed phishers that threaten to haunt our houses, the litigators armed to go tricking--not treating--every night of the year, and the reactionaries unnecessarily frightening those with a legitimate interest in furthering opportunities. We get through those issues, and we can focus on scary opportunities. Scary good, not scary bad.
Happy Halloween.
Biography
Jonathan Schwartz is president and chief operating officer of Sun Microsystems.
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patent, Sun Microsystems Inc., handset, litigation, phishing
44 comments
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Sun is right patents are hurting us. We need to work on logical patents for those with too much money. Patenting the double click for small devices? Give me a break. It is like someone getting the pattent for taking two steps in a row instead of one step and one step.
With another presidential election coming soon I would also like to say "I invented the internet". ( quotation from a prior election ).
One of the original purposes of patents was to have a usable database of knowledge concerning how to build things. I seriously doubt that is the case anymore. I can find in my field many instances where it is quicker for me to re-invent the idea than it is to try to look it up. That says there is no good way to search (even with all the improvements that have been made) and that the ability to search is severely hindered by the incredibly obscure and painful language many are written in. It also says something about the obviousness of the ideas. If anybody competent in a field is presented a problem with the same constraints as that solved by a patent can come up with a mechanism or process to solve that problem in a matter of hours, it serves only an anti-competitive purpose to patent that idea.
Sun is sending the message out that these things are worth good money if you simply litigate. The US government has a policy not to negociate with terrorists; High tech companies should have a policy of not negociating with extortionists willing to license them trivial and most likely illegitimate patents.
What the industry needs to do is call a pruce and sign a treaty similar to the global nuclear disarmament treaty. It is time that all large companies, including Sun, decide to reduce their stockpiles of wasteful patent ammunition that is doing nothing but stifling competition.
You want American businesses to simply give up their intellectual property? Give me a break. A patent is legal and legitimate until it has been declared otherwise by a US court of law. Companies refusing to honor patents that they don't like will find themselves in a heap of legal troubles.
Like a previous suggests... Find a solution before you destroy the existing system. Eliminating software patents will simply not happen.
RFID is a great idea - but I have to side with your Doctor on this one. When your kid is 17, on the run from the cops with a joint in his pocket - he's not going to be too thrilled that you installed a short range tracking device between his shoulder blades. Okay, the chances that one day he will become a political activist, on the run from the evil empire are slim - but still just because it can be used for reasonable purposes doesn't mean it shouldn't be heavily monitored and regulated. As you admit yourself, the opportunities for abuse are huge - even at the least orweniable (is that a word?) end of the scale, e.g. crank up the volume a bit, and allow marketeers in your home city to track what kinds of goods you like to purchase, and get an estimate of your disposable income. The outcome, even more annoying phone calls during the one time you crave piece. That little bit of time you need to call your own, between putting the kids to bed and getting to bed yourself.
As for the potential to cash in on the need for speed. Well if the government had invested 200 billion dollars in the communications network of America, instead of some personal vendetta in Iraq - maybe we'd actually have enough bandwidth, for this week anyway. Imagine what each state could do with 4 billion dollars to spend of telecommunications networking. Imagine the jobs that would have generated - the high paying, top network jobs that are slowly disappearing. Imagine the knock on effect of those jobs, after all what's the use of being high paid if you can't have a plasma TV in every room, a jacuzzi fitted in your bedroom , a landscaped rain forest for a yard - all jobs that would be created to support your new found lifestyle.
Yes it speaks of government subsidy, but if the contracts were forced to be transparently bidded on - the opportunities for abuse would be scaled down at least a bit.
The end result though, would be a country that has a broadband network to rival Japan and South Korea.
"Patents are too easy to get, but only for the wrong people. Corporations that have the finance to buy patents are the only winners - the little guy that thought up a million dollar idea, but couldn't get the investment to protect himself, always loses to Microsoft, err I mean big business."
I couldn't disagree more. That is NOT how the patent system works at all. My grandfather was a poor man for most of his life and was able to obtain patents for his own invetions. They paid off and he made a decent living. Patents are not for the rich, and the system does not cater to the rich. The wealthy can simply afford more research that results is patentable ideas and products. And that is exactly how it should be.
Software is exactly like books. It is merely a collection of words. There is no new technology in any piece of software. With perhaps the exception of using a new hardware technology. There is also an infinite number of ways to get the exact same software.
Copyrighting software is more then sufficient to protect companies investments.
You people should just learn to ignore Mr Arbagast(sp?). He is just an ignorant MS worshipper. If Uncle Bill told him the world was flat he would be frothing at the mouth at any suggestion otherwise.
Keep on ASSuming.