A recent report has revealed that fewer than one in 50 Windows PCs are fully patched despite the software provider’s promises at purchase. A patch is a small piece of software designed to fix problems with or update a computer program or its supporting data. This includes fixing bugs, replacing graphics and improving the usability or performance. The report included a sample of 20,000 Windows users who revealed that 98.1% of them had insecure programs installed on their Windows machines. With the majority of SMEs using Windows based applications what measures can they put in place to counteract the obvious problems?
It is important for SMEs to be aware that these problems are around and quickly take corrective action. More and more internet attacks take advantage of application vulnerabilities rather than flaws in underlying operating systems. That means that keeping patches up to date is becoming more important.
There are three distinct ways of tackling patching issues. Firstly, SMEs can manually configure their networks. This requires someone with a vast knowledge of IT to be able to explore where there are potential flaws or missing patches in the network and subsequently find and install the necessary patches. This is a very technical and time consuming process and may involve some downtime in the company network.
Secondly, SMEs can purchase patch management software such as Microsoft’s WSUS product. This is a server based application and helps to manage how patches are released onto your network. Again however, this is a very technical piece of software to use and is usually used by IT administrators and managers. They, in turn, then fully manage the distribution of updates that are released through Microsoft Update to computers in their network. Without the technical knowledge, SMEs wouldn’t know which patches they wanted and didn’t want, and could end up doing unnecessary damage to their network.
The third option, and the most obvious one for SMEs who don’t have an IT Manager internally, is to outsource the job to a patching service provider. This is becoming increasingly favoured with the emergence of cloud computing where the software is purchased and utilised over the internet. All network flaws will be picked up and consequently managed by the patching service provider. This results in improved business continuity and SMEs left rest assured that any problems are dealt with by those with the correct knowledge.
SMEs need to remember that with this type of problem it is important to stay up to date and current in order to maintain their business efficiency.
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2009-02-19 (LM)