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 Yesterday, on July 2, we finally delivered the new product line - Outpost Pro 2009! We've informing you about our progress with this release for a few weeks, and now we have to say Monday Updates are over and everyone can taste one of the products (or all).We encourage you to download the new products: Outpost Security Suite Pro 2009 Outpost Firewall Pro 2009 Outpost Antivirus Pro 2009 To give you a quick summary of what we've done in Outpost 2009 (frequent readers of this blog are already familiar with the majority of them) : User interface and controls • Protection Status Overview: The new dashboard-style display provides a summary of the current Outpost protection status – from the state of updates to the level of security settings. • Basic/Expert Interface Toggle: By switching between the Basic and Expert interface layouts, users can customize their preferred view of the main program window. • Improved Event Logger Manageability: The tried-and-true Outpost 4.0 event logger is back with its per-category filterable and sortable log entries. • New Process Activity Monitor: This utility lists all currently active processes in expandable format, providing quick access to key properties. • More Informative Network Activity Monitor: Outpost 2009 sports a redesigned, more logical Network Activity display where connections are grouped by application. Performance “Gain without pain” was the goal here; Outpost 2009 challenges the stereotype of security products as resource hogs and eliminates a number of potential slow-downs. SmartScan now runs up to ten times faster than in earlier versions, and data stream processing is much more efficient. This is achieved by storing the history of past malware scans in a single secure location, instead of all PC folders, as in Outpost 2008. New functionality The core security layer in all three products has been further reinforced to withstand latest internal sabotage attacks and addresses the most lethal leak techniques employed by undetectable malware: Extended Host Protection: To fully protect users against inappropriate activity, Outpost now includes protection against the latest security breach techniques. Outpost’s perfect leaktest pass scores reflect the product’s ability to protect against attacks on personal data employed by real, in-the-wild malware. Protection Against Keyloggers (this is what we haven't revealed in our Monday Updates!): Outpost’s Host Protection protects systems against keylogger activity, monitoring system events and ensuring that no malicious keyboard interaction is possible. This prevents the unwitting disclosure of personal information, including passwords and credit card numbers. IP Blocklist Keeps Surfing Clean: IP Blocklist lets users blacklist specified Internet domains and restrict incoming and outgoing traffic from sites with bad reputations. The list of blocked entries can be manually defined or imported from different web communities. Antispam supports The Bat!: Agnitum’s Bayesian-based antispam module, formerly compatible only with Microsoft mail clients, can now be integrated into the popular The Bat! email application. System requirements Outpost 2009 is compatible with Windows Vista SP1, XP SP3, and Server 2008 as well as all previous 32- and 64-bit versions from Windows 2000 onwards. All three products will work smoothly on a 450 MHz or faster CPU (x-86/x-64/multi-core) with 256Mb RAM. Don't hesitate to try the new product line! Were looking forward to your feedback! Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect, Agtnitum As you’ve probably already realized, Outpost Pro 2009 is not just a pretty face. So this Monday, we’re going ‘under the hood’ to take a look at some of the more technical improvements to the software.
Outpost has always been a leader in proactive defense and to prove it has consistently scored well on independent leaktests. These tests are performed on a regular basis by Matousec Transparent Security and in some cases can be a useful way to understand where our own vulnerabilities might lie (not everything can be picked up by internal testing). Such was the case with a recent set of tests, and we have responded by further strengthening Outpost’s anti-leak capabilities. We’ve also increased protection against leaks and zero-day threats in Outpost 2009 with the addition of a dedicated anti-keylogger protection.  As you can see in this screen shot, “keyboard logging” has been added to the Anti-Leak Control tab of the Host Protection module, so that any attempt to capture keystrokes by an unauthorized application will be immediately noted and blocked. So, as well as the pretty face, Outpost 2009 will bring greater control over the unauthorized capture of your valuable digital information. We look forward to independent verification of the effectiveness of these new protections in upcoming tests. In the meantime, we encourage you to try them out yourself by downloading the latest beta at http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/betatest.php. You can find our Outpost 2009-related Monday blog posts at http://agnitumblog.blogspot.com/search/label/monday%20update%202009 or subscribe to the RSS feed. The product release date is approaching, but we still have some product secrets to share with you, so keep your eye out for the next update. Take care online, Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect, Agnitum  This Monday we’re not looking at any particular features, but rather analyzing the overall performance of Outpost 2009 and the impact of other improvements on the products’ improved speed of operation.We’ve already touched on this topic when we looked at the revamped SmartScan (SmartScan 2 – smarter and faster than ever!). We mentioned then that this single feature will make repeated malware scans 100 times faster, whatever the capacity of your hard drive! As a consequence, the overall performance of the products increases tenfold, assuming a normal mode of operation on the PC. The way we cache antivirus checks has also been significantly improved, as has the speed of processing data streamed from the web. In short, your PC will not slow down when the Outpost real-time scanner is active or when you run an on-demand scan. Rather than measuring the performance improvement ratio in percentage terms, we say that your PC will function at almost the same speed as it would with no antivirus installed and running. System start-up, program launch, files copying, processing of a large number of files (photo archives, for instance), automatic scheduled scans – all benefit from these performance improvements in terms of speed and efficiency. As a result, your PC has only a very small additional CPU load compared to a clean system, dramatically decreased hard-drive load and economic use of kernel memory when file activity is intense. We’re not saying the performance improvements can’t be quantified – but performance is a user experience, so why not try the product out for yourself? You can join our beta program and download the software today at http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/betatest.php. You can find our Outpost 2009-related Monday blog posts at http://agnitumblog.blogspot.com/search/label/monday%20update%202009 or subscribe to the RSS feed. There are still more 2009-related notes to come, so stay tuned! See you next Monday! Take care online, Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect, Agnitum This Monday we’re looking at one of the most important parts of the GUI. What you were used to as the Welcome screen in Outpost 2008 has been renamed My Security for Outpost 2009, and has undergone some significant changes. It’s no secret that changing this screen was at the top of our users’ wish-lists for 2009, so now you can take a look at what we’ve done and see whether you think we’ve made the right decisions.
Here’s what the Outpost 2008 main window looks like:  What you see is the news section, registration / update info and My Shortcuts. In Outpost 2009, the My Security page also displays the status of Outpost’s components. If you click on the status type, the corresponding settings will appear. These settings are as follows:
 We believe this new layout will give you greater transparency and ease-of-use. You can easily access any basic setting with a single click and check the status of the different components. It’s easy to adjust the level of security and enable or disable components according to your needs and experience. Plus you’ll never forget important product updates – My Security will remind you in good time. In summary, the new design makes it quicker and easier for all users to configure the program appropriately for their optimum protection. To test this yourself, please join our beta program at http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/betatest.php and evaluate the product. As always, you can find our Outpost 2009-related Monday blog posts at http://agnitumblog.blogspot.com/search/label/monday%20update%202009 or subscribe to the RSS feed. There are still more feature notes to come! See you next Monday! Take care online, Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect, Agnitum This Monday we’re taking a look at another GUI tweak in Outpost 2009 – this time, a more convenient display of Online Activity. In the same way as the Network and Process Activity, this log of active web processes is now more customizable and visually attractive.
Here’s how the display looks in Outpost 2008:  The new layout displays the following columns by default: - Process - Host Address - File Name - Object Size If you want to see a full URL address and Object type, just select the Columns command by right-clicking on the process. We’ve also added in a time lag on the deletion of obsolete records; in Outpost 2009 they are marked in grey before being removed (the same as in the Network Activity monitor). Here’s a screenshot of the Online Activity monitor in Outpost 2009:  By suppressing long addresses and additional details, the information is easier to read without having to scroll around. One more small but helpful way to improve the usability of Outpost 2009. As always, please feel free to join our beta program at http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/betatest.php and evaluate the product for yourself. You can find our Outpost 2009-related Monday blog posts at http://agnitumblog.blogspot.com/search/label/monday%20update%202009 or subscribe to the RSS feed. See you next Monday! Take care online, Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect, Agnitum We’re sharing with you here some interesting statistics based on research conducted by Neil Rubenking (Senior Analyst at PC Magazine US). The table below was not published by Neil or by PC Magazine, but we complied it using the points given to the listed products in Neil’s reviews.
TS stands for 'total score', SW - for 'spyware', KL - for 'keyloggers'.
We were delighted to find that Outpost Security Suite Pro 2008 came out ahead of such products as Kaspersky Internet Security 7.0, Panda Internet Security 2008 and ESET Smart Security 3.0 in terms or removing and blocking spyware and keyloggers. OSS 2008 took second place after Symantec’s Norton 360. We believe this technological success is due at least in part to the number of improvements Agnitum has been implementing in its antimalware engine. In the meantime, we keep on working, adding new signatures, analyzing new types of spyware as well as strengthening scanning speed and detection rate. Look out for our Monday Updates in this blog and learn more about the improvements in the upcoming Outpost 2009! Alexey Belkin Chief Software Architect, Agnitum This Monday we’re reviewing another improvement to Outpost 2009’s ease-of-use – Simple / Expert View Switcher. Complex logging and configuration information is really not necessary for everyday use, so we decided to create the option of a simplified view.
The simple view omits the Network Activity, Used Ports, Attack Detection, Process Activity and Online Activity menus, and displays just the basic logs. You can choose either simple or expert layout during installation, as this automatically corresponds with the security level options (Normal and Advanced respectively). After installation, you can switch between views by clicking the link in the lower left corner of the program screen. Here’s how it looks in the interface:  As a consequence of this improvement, we also disabled the logs shift on the Event Viewer page (Advanced Logs Enable/Disable link) and the checkmark Show advanced logs in the Logs settings. This new option is primarily for the benefit of users who like to keep things simple and see just the essential information without any extras, while advanced users may choose the enhanced type of protection and configuration tools. The new option also makes program navigation simpler and quicker. As always, we encourage you to see how it works in practice! Please join our beta program at http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/betatest.php and evaluate the product for yourself. You can find our Outpost 2009-related Monday blog posts at http://agnitumblog.blogspot.com/search/label/monday%20update%202009 or subscribe to the RSS feed. Look out for another great feature description next Monday! Take care online, Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect, Agnitum This Monday we’re looking at a new layout for an old feature – the Process Activity monitor. In both Outpost 2008 and 2009, this tab was situated with the Host protection module which enables the program to proactively block zero-day threats and potential viruses before they can infect a PC. By tracking running processes and their characteristics, it is possible to analyze their status and easily implement firewall rules to ensure the best protection.
You may remember that our first posting in this 2009 series was focused on Network Activity Monitor improvements. We’ve tweaked the Process Activity display in the same way – it now uses a tree-like structure that will remind you of Process Explorer. For instance, in this tab you can access details on how the process was started, the rules related to this or that application, and other properties with a simple double-click. To terminate a process, you can either right- click and choose Terminate or hit the Delete key. These are just a couple of examples. To expand a little: All the “branches” of the tree are maximized by default, and you’ll find corresponding icons beside every application name. The Toggle Sort command (see the Context Menu screenshot below) leads to the “flat” structure display, with sorting enabled. All unknown (unsigned) applications are displayed in dark blue. The 2009 Process Activity layout offers three columns by default: - Process - Company - Anti-Leak Rules plus additional columns: - PID [Process Identifier] - Connections - Bytes Sent/Recv - Speed Sent/Recv - Full Path Here's how the Context Menu for a process looks:  For comparison, we suggest you take a look at the current Process Activity module in Outpost 2008:  Now here’s the new 2009 design:  We believe we’ve done the right thing and made the access to rules easier and the overall display much clearer. The 2009 design gives you more control over the program, as all the essential properties are easily available, so you can edit or disable a process instantly – essential when you’re dealing with a potential malware infection. As always, we encourage you to join our beta program at http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/betatest.php and evaluate the product yourself! You can read our 2009-related Monday blog at http://agnitumblog.blogspot.com/search/label/monday%20update%202009 or subscribe to the RSS feed. See you next Monday for another great new Outpost 2009 feature analysis! Take care online, Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect, Agnitum This Monday we’re revisiting a feature that originated as a third-party plugin as part of Outpost 2008 and has now been revamped for the 2009 product. Here’s a little history.
The Blockpost plugin was originally developed by an Outpost fan and was designed to prevent any installed software from accessing malicious web sites or ad networks by using a blacklist of IP addresses. Many of you wanted to see this feature as an integrated part of the Outpost products, but there were compatibility issues with Outpost 2008 related to support for Vista, IPv6 and x64 systems. We were able to resolve these issues, and as an integrated module in Outpost, Blockpost now works faster, is more reliable, and fully supports the new technologies. Blockpost’s IP address blacklist is completely user-controlled and user-generated. You can upload your own lists of infective IPs, even define a range of IP numbers that you consider unsafe. And you don’t have to spend extra time creating rules - there are text-based lists of bad IPs easily available on the Internet. But we recommend you double-check the IPs before adding them to the blacklist - some lists are old and the IP addresses on those lists may have become legitimate in the meantime. In summary, Blockpost saves you time and trouble by ensuring that the websites you visit are legitimate, supports the new Outpost architectures, and provides more control and stability for your browsing. In Outpost 2009, we’ve embedded the Blockpost functionality into the IP Blocklist tab on the Firewall menu. Using the Add button, you can specify host addresses as IP, IP range, IP with mask, and domain name; the Remove button deletes any selected address from the list, and Removal all clears the entire list. The Export and Import buttons save or upload lists of addresses in or from a file respectively. The lists for the old Blockpost plug-in are fully compatible with the new module. Blocking events are added to the Packet Log as Blocked according to IP Blocklist. The ability to log the blocking event or show a corresponding alert are controlled by the Log the dropped packet and Show visual alert when packet is dropped options. Here’s what it looks like today:   We believe this new layout provides a more logical way to define unwanted web sources and effectively completes the menu of firewall-related customizations. Anyway, there’s nothing to compare with trying the product yourself, so we encourage you to join our beta program at http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/betatest.php. Also, keep your eye out for more 2009-related Monday blog-notes at http://agnitumblog.blogspot.com/search/label/monday%20update%202009 or subscribe to the RSS feed. See you next Monday! Take care online, Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect, Agnitum  In the third of our series of pre-Outpost 2009 improvements, we’ll take a look at the revamped SmartScan technology. Even if you’ve never delved below the surface of Outpost’s functionality, you will have noticed that a quick malware scan is performed in no time and even a full scan is pretty quick; well, that’s all thanks to Outpost’s SmartScan option. First implemented in Outpost Security Suite Pro 2007, this function (optional but highly recommended) worked on the principle of storing the details of previous scans in cached files in every folder on your PC; this avoided the need to recheck data that had already been scanned and had not changed since the last scan.While this option was a great time-saver, in its original form it also caused anti-rootkit software to false-alarm on these cached files. Of course, these files were quite benign and not rootkits at all. They were protected by Outpost’s self-protection, so that no malware could subvert them (i.e., edit or delete them). Outpost 2009, to everyone’s relief, will no longer cause these false alarms to occur. In the new version, all data about previously scanned items and folders is stored in a single file in the Windows/System32/ folder. Not only is gathering information from one source faster and easier for the scanner, but it also helps to avoid the abovementioned ‘false positive’ issue. This technology change goes hand-in-hand with some GUI tweaks, such as: - During the installation, the ‘Enable SmartScan’ option is checked by default, regardless of which operating system is in use - You won’t see any more program requests for clearing cache files on uninstall. In summary: malware scans will be even faster and the program will require less user interaction while still preserving the ability to customize.  According to our estimations, the new SmartScan should operate 10 times faster! Of course, the best way for you to check and understand the benefits of these changes is to experience them yourself, so why not download the latest beta at http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/betatest.php. For more 2009-related Monday blog-notes, please check http://agnitumblog.blogspot.com/search/label/monday%20update%202009 or subscribe to the RSS feed. Next Monday – another new feature! Take care online, Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect, Agnitum The second in our series of Outpost 2009-related updates covers the newly-redesigned log display. Interestingly, this is a rare example of reverse development - in Outpost 2009, we are implementing the same logs structure as we had in Outpost Firewall Pro 4.0, though on a new platform and with some significant improvements.
Current users of Outpost 2008, either the firewall or the suite, can track events in text format. This approach has its pluses and minuses – while it enables users to do more with the data, it’s also more complicated for users to do that extra work. You’ve told us in no uncertain terms that you prefer the old approach, displaying events in chart form. Here’s the events viewer in Outpost 2008:  And here’s what the new viewer looks like:  We hope you agree that we’ve made the right decision! We have made the new viewer more flexible, too. Whereas Outpost 2008 groups information which might affect usability, the new version shows all parameters separately in columns, with transparent details on, for example, sent and received traffic, IPs or ports. Outpost 2009 will provide more options for filtering and sorting data within the various sections, like Firewall and Anti-Leak Control. A convenient “show” bar helps you to filter events by type and period, for example: “Allowed”, “Allowed during last 10 minutes”, “Allowed today”, “Blocked”, etc.  Outpost 2009 also lets you set up a filter by value for every column and row by right-clicking and selecting Exclude/Include commands; the “Show all” command disables the filter. One additional improvement is the subdivision of the Web Control menu in the Events Viewer to show two parameters: history of downloads and history of blocked connections. A short summary of what Outpost 2009 will offer in terms of logs: - Detailed charts - Easier filtering and sorting - Better configuration with new menus Plus we’ve included some neat design tweaks, placed “refresh” and “clear” buttons in the toolbar and some other small improvements. In summary, the new event viewer offers greater usability for advanced users and, more importantly, more control over the product. With the new events structure, it’s easier to analyze logs quickly and in detail to draw the right conclusions and customize your protection appropriately for your current conditions (and common sense). We welcome your thoughts and impressions of this “new old” feature and, if you haven’t already signed up, join our beta test program at http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/betatest.php. That way, you can check the changes as they happen and give us instant feedback to improve the product. In the meantime, keep your eye on this tag link to Monday updates: http://agnitumblog.blogspot.com/search/label/monday%20update%202009 and subscribe to the RSS feed. See you next Monday! Cheers, Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect, Agnitum This blog posting is the first in a series where I’ll describe the new features and improvements we’re making as we develop the Outpost Pro 2009 products, which are now going into beta. We’re encouraging everyone to get to know the new versions gradually, learning all aspects of what’s new and what’s better, so we can get your feedback as we develop the products. Many of the improvements in our products are suggested by our users, so you might find your idea in a future blog posts in this series. Look for new information about Outpost Pro 2009 here every Monday!
Many of the improvements involve the GUI and the overall ease-of-use of the products. The first aspect I’m going to write about is the new Network Activity window, whose goal is to provide you with real-time information about what’s going on inside and outside of your PC. Those of you who have used our products before will recognize the screenshots below. Here’s how the Network Activity monitor screen looks like in Outpost Security Suite 2008:  And here’s the 2009 version:  We received many requests to implement this feature, so here it is. The driving principle in the new implementation is the grouping of connections for applications, which we were not able to implement in the 2008 products. This enables you to see traffic summaries as well as separate data for each connection. You can also group connections by column. Another thing we’re planning to do here is enable application properties and rules list pop-ups when you double-click on an item, so you don’t have to choose Settings and then further options to see the details. A small but useful point which should be implemented in an upcoming iteration. So what’s the benefit of this approach over the corresponding display in Outpost 2008? In a word, consistency. The more convenient display and simple grouping of items makes the information easier to understand and more intuitive, as you would expect in a mature product like Outpost. If you would like to try the beta-version yourself and help us improve the product, please go to http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/betatest.php. We look forward to welcoming you to our beta testing family, and don’t forget to check back here next Monday for another preview. To make it even easier, subscribe to our RSS-feed to receive new information as soon as it’s posted. Cheers, Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect, Agnitum In our Security Teacher series of articles we’ve already reviewed the key essentials in security software (firewall, antivirus, proactive tools), it’s now time to take a look at some applications that will enhance those basic security measures with additional security and privacy capabilities.
Read on to see what the antispam can do for you, along with anti-phishing tools and web browsing security, and don't hesitate to share your comments here and in the Security Teacher! Igor Pankov, Security Teacher (Insight) author  Yesterday, on March 18, 2008 we launched the standalone antivirus solution – Outpost Antivirus Pro (OAV) with extended functionality including antivirus, antispyware, proactive protection mechanisms and web control elements. By this release we rounded up our security solutions arsenal, and now provide both reactive and proactive defense for those seeking for separates security products and all-in-one protection fans.What’s included in Outpost Antivirus Pro?
As you may judge by the features list, OAV is a proactive antivirus that inherited host protection and self-protection functionality from its big brother – Outpost Security Suite Pro 2008. Two antimalware labs (our partner’s analysts and the in-house team) are working to ensure latest virus and spyware updates, the most valuable factor in the antivirus industry. What’s also special about Outpost Antivirus Pro is its price or rather the pricing model. Whereas an average AV vendor would set a higher complex price for the initial purchase (around $40) to cover its development and marketing expenses, Agnitum charges its customers just for the updates. That is: with OAV you pay $19.95 at the first buy and for all following updates every year. We are not inclined to increase the price artificially as we didn’t create the product from scratch (but transferred existing functionality from OSS) and are not going to invest huge sums into advertising. Agnitum suggests the user pay for what really matters – daily database updates and support. You can download the software at: http://www.agnitum.com/products/antivirus/download.php . There’s an important note for those of you who prefer bundling standalone solutions. Outpost Antivirus should not be installed on a machine that’s already running Outpost Firewall Pro or Outpost Security Suite! Having two products on one machine will cause conflicts, as all the solutions contain host protection mechanisms that would be involved in a fight when used simultaneously. So let us deter you from such experiments. However, being a user of Outpost Firewall Pro, you can upgrade to Outpost Security Suite that includes antivirus functionally with a 60% discount, click here for details. Anyway, in case you already have Agnitum’s products installed and would like to somehow take advantage of Outpost Antivirus Pro despite the incompatibilities, there is going to be a special gift for you. You’ll find all the details in Agnitum’s March newsletter, so keep your eyes on: http://www.agnitum.com/news/agnitumnewsletter/index.php page or just subscribe to know the latest news. Mikhail Penkovsky, Global VP for Marketing and Sales, Agnitum What do you think about the way anti-virus vendors price their offerings? We’ve been mulling over some ideas on this and would like to share them with you. Hopefully, you’ll have some thoughts to share with us as well. Antivirus solutions have been on the market for around 20 years now and are pretty much a commodity item. Most people install one, “just to be safe”. Even most security suites seem to be built around anti-virus (although a few of us do build them around the firewall). So what’s the difference between firewall protection and anti-virus protection? A firewall can function “as is” without any updates, it has preset functionality, a predefined set of measures to defend against intrusions, data leak and other threats. Anti-virus, on the other hand, is more based on the update principle and ensures effective protection as long as the virus definitions are kept up to date. Obviously, I don’t underestimate the value of scanning speed and accuracy, or, a convenient user interface, but the fact remains that it is the constant updates that characterize anti-virus most strongly in contrast with firewalls. With this in mind, let’s look typical pricing for antivirus protection. When setting prices, vendors of course need to take their own cost basis into account. Those costs can be split into two major categories: development-related and promotion-related. Leaving development aside (we all have to do development, let’s face it), the real differential in spending comes into play with marketing. After all, no-one buys a product they’ve never heard of. So, millions are spent to tell you about these products. Who pays for this? Software manufacturers do, and – yes! – you do, too! Imagine an equation: development expenses + promotion expenses + updates (antivirus services) = initial software price. If we assume that the typical initial price for an anti-virus product is $39.95, industry averages indicate that number is made up of $10 base development, $10 marketing, and $20 (give or take) on the research, implementation, testing, and distribution costs related to updates. So when you renew your anti-virus subscription, you’re typically paying around $20 a year for that ($30 if the company does *a lot* of marketing). So my question is – since anti-virus is a commodity and thus most of the initial development costs were amortized years ago, why are vendors still charging as if they wrote the software last week? Looking forward to your thoughts! Mikhail Penkovsky, Global VP for Marketing and Sales, Yesterday (February 26, 2008) Agnitum Team issued two important bug-fixes for Outpost Firewall Pro and Outpost Security Suite Pro 2008.
The following improvements were introduced:
You can download the new versions at the respective product pages: http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/download.php http://www.agnitum.com/products/security-suite/download.php Looking forward to your feedback and thoughts. Alexey Belkin Chief Software Architect Agnitum Ltd. This February we continue our series of security knowledge refresher and focus on antivirus, another indispensable component of computer defense. Read on and leave your comments!
Igor Pankov Product Marketing Manager Agnitum Ltd. Dear readers,
First of all, we hope you are having a good start to 2008! This January we offer some more interesting reading. The main Security Teacher article concerns the software firewall as one of the security options. This is the first text in a series of articles related to modern security solutions present on the market. Don't hesitate to read "Security Choices, Part 1: The Software Firewall" and share your opinions in this blog or in the Security Teacher web-page. Igor Pankov, Product Marketing Manager, Agnitum Ltd. Microsoft recently released a patch correcting the first ever kernel-level vulnerability that applies exclusively to Vista. The vulnerability affects both the 32 and 64-bit versions of Vista. We advise you to install a patch to protect systems (use Windows Update to install automatically or visit the following links to get the corresponding updates: Vista 32-bit; Vista 64 bit). Fortunately, the vulnerability was diligently disclosed to the vendor and no malware could conceivably be made off the exploit, so it is believed that users were not impacted. What’s interesting, if it hasn’t been for Patch Guard (Kernel Patch Protection) that Microsoft unilaterally implemented in its 64-bit Windows family, independent security vendors would have a better chance to somehow temporarily mitigate the flaw and protect users while the official patch is in works. As a number of security experts predicted and according to our estimates (here and here), Patch Guard in alone failed to cover up for Microsoft lapses in OS design and development. Patch Guard acts by locking accesses to Windows kernel, the core part of the operating system, making any legal interaction with it, including attempts to reinforce it against malicious code, impossible. Being denied an opportunity to strengthen the kernel, the hope is only on Microsoft in how quickly it can react to accidents like in the future and promptly remediate a problem. Not all vulnerabilities are promptly disclosed, some of them become part of the public domain, and out of that knowledge, malware springs up like wildfire. To get the idea of the impact of Patch Guard, suppose every lock in the town is made by a single locksmith. As soon as thieves figure out how to break one lock, all dwellers become exposed because their locks are similarly weak. There’s no one to turn to, since in this case the locksmith is Microsoft, and other locksmiths are denied proper access. Igor Pankov Product Marketing Manager, Agnitum Ltd. Yesterday, on December 20, 2007 we launched a small hot-fix for both Outpost Firewall Pro and Outpost Security Suite Pro 2008. The same changes as applied to the firewall are topical for the all-in-one product, too.
So you can check either History link for details: http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/history.php http://www.agnitum.com/products/security-suite/history.php Don't hesitate to download the latest OSS and OFP builds. Alexey Belkin, Chief Software Architect Agnitum Ltd.  Have you ever thought that your web-surfing habits and attitude to Internet security might be related to your Zodiac sign? Everyone is different and so is their behavior. But we believe there is a pattern that reflects the characteristics of various Zodiac signs. Of course, you shouldn’t take this Agnitum astrology too seriously – after all, we specialize in predicting threats, not behaviors - but we’re sure you’ll have fun figuring out where your security strengths and weaknesses should lie!Click here to see your Internet Security Horoscope. Igor Pankov, Product Marketing Manager, Agnitum Ltd.  We are happy to announce the results of the latest anti-virus tests carried out by Virus Bulletin magazine on Outpost Security Suite 2008 and 32 other personal anti-virus and security suite products running under Windows 2000. By achieving 100% for its anti-virus capabilities in these tests, Outpost Security Suite Pro clearly shows that it is fully compliant with today’s requirements for effective anti-virus protection.According to Virus Bulletin, “the product looked good and proved pleasant to work with, offering a wide range of modules which sadly went unexplored. With good detection across the test sets and no false positives generated in the clean sets, Agnitum earns a VB100 award”. The VB100 award comes hot on the heels of another 100% award on November 2, 2007, when Agnitum’s flagship product Outpost Firewall Pro 2008 scored 100 % in the Matousec Transparent Security (www.matousec.com) leak tests, beating out more than 40 competiors. The latest editions of Outpost Firewall Pro and Outpost Security Suite Pro 2008 are available for download at http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/download.php and http://www.agnitum.com/products/security-suite/download.php respectively. Mikhail Penkovsky,Global VP of Marketing and Sales, Agnitum Ltd. We are happy to announce the launch of “Christmas editions” for the company’s Vista-compatible products: Outpost Firewall Pro (OFP) and Outpost Security Suite Pro 2008 (OSS) comprising the new 2008 product line. The latest versions represent a series of significant improvements in technology and GUI and eliminate compatibility issues with third-party solutions.
The improvements include tweaks in the following components: • Network activity and Proactive protection. — With the introduction of new functionality it has become possible to manually group connections of certain applications and terminate defined connections. • Attack detection. — false positives while visiting some web-sites eliminated. • Web-control for Vista. — distortion of certain web-sites’ content eliminated. • Log Viewer. — the improvements concern increased usability (viewing, export, clearing, saving the viewer’s records and configuration). • Antivirus+Antispyware. — the new operation mechanism implemented to reduce resource consumption and time (including the revamped antivirus scanner, possibility to “cure” infected software which registers as LSP or requires reboot; restoring files from the quarantine in case the resource folder was missing). Due to these latest updates we’ve also eliminated the most common cases of OSS and OFP halts, service initialization issues after installation, as well as rootkits threat. Single alerts in the auto-learn mode has been removed; the procedure of new configuration settings in case of installing OSS 2008 above OSS 2007 has been corrected. The size of OSS 2008 installation file was decreased to 30 Mb. You can find more detailed information about the changes in OSS and OFP on the web-site. Alexey Belkin Chief Software Architect Agnitum Ltd. Here's our Security Insight for November. The topic is 64-bit Vista Security.
Microsoft’s Windows Vista was released almost a year ago. In the run-up to the launch, Bill Gates pledged to make Vista security the number one priority for the company. By writing code that was secure by design and implementation, the intention was to render the OS impermeable to the sophisticated malware and remote intrusion attacks that dogged its predecessor, Windows XP. Microsoft spent five full years creating the new OS from scratch and, by the time it hit the market in late January 2007, it was already two years later than originally planned. Read more and share your thoughts in this blog. Igor Pankov, Product Marketing Manager, Agnitum Outpost Firewall Pro and Outpost Security Suite Pro 2008 go hand in glove in their continued improvement. As you remember, the hot-fix based on the final release picture appeared just two days after the product launch - on October 24, 2007. One more followed on November 2 and the latest was uploaded just yesterday. The corrections to the standalone product were also applied to the all-in-one solution as usual. Here's the list of resolved problems, just to mention a few:
You can view the entire history of changes at http://www.agnitum.com/products/security-suite/history.php or http://www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/history.php depending on the product. Don't hesitate to download either OSS or OFP and check the difference. Alexey Belkin Chief Software Architect Agnitum | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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