Essays Tagged "OutlookBusiness"

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Paying the Cost of Insecure Software

Having a liability clause is one good way to make sure that software vendors fix the security glitches in their products.

  • Bruce Schneier
  • OutlookBusiness
  • October 5, 2007

Information insecurity is costing us billions. We pay for it—year after year—when we buy security products and services. But all the money we spend isn’t fixing the problem, which is insecure software. Typically, such software is badly designed and inadequately tested, comprising poorly implemented features and security vulnerabilities.

Rather than paying to improve the security of the underlying software by fixing the bug permanently, we pay to deal with the problem on an ad-hoc basis. Vendors are the only ones who can fix this problem for good. however, they will not do so unless it works out to their best financial interests…

Sidebar photo of Bruce Schneier by Joe MacInnis.