Whatever...

Nice story, shame about the real world

By Mike King

A recent story from SaaS company Nasstar predicted that IT departments would disappear by 2013.  Hats off to them I thought, they’ve come up with a decent angle to ensure good pick up of the story in the IT press.  And it worked – I’ve already seen the story picked up by PC Pro, Computer World UK and Computer Weekly, and I’m sure there’ll be more to come. 

Of course, as a SaaS company, you’d expect Nasstar to be telling everybody that the need for on-site IT will disappear and in five years time, users will all logon to the internet for everything they need.  But even so, a good solid example of effective PR.

However, back in the real world, the thing that detracts from their argument is the claim that there is far less that can go wrong with hosted rather than on-premises IT. 

From my experience, finding a company that can provide a consistently reliable email system is nigh on impossible so the thought of relying on external service providers for every business critical application is unlikely to catch on any time soon.  Apart from anything else, at least if there’s a problem in your own environment you can get on and fix it.  Service providers, on the other hand, are past masters at passing the buck.

A fundamental shift in the attitude of service providers and a massive improvement in the reliability and performance of the whole broadband infrastructure needs to happen first. I don’t doubt that it’s coming, but those things aren’t quick to fix.  Five years?  Really? 

So, nice story – but I just don’t believe it.

Another year, another CeBIT!

By Ingrid Daschner

Harald Schmidt, a German TV entertainer with a penchant for uncomfortable truths and crude puns, once said: “Hanover may not be the arse of the world, but it does give you a good glimpse of it.”

Well, that’s not quite how I would describe the capital of Lower Saxony, but then our business doesn’t leave me enough time to investigate all sides of Hanover. For when the annual CeBIT exhibition is upon us, my life is dominated by the frantic run-up to the fair, numerous press kits and non-stop pitching.

Yet somehow it’s actually rather enjoyable – although I fully understand when I ring journalists up just before CeBIT when they say with a sigh of relief: “I’m so glad I don’t have to go to Hanover this year!” When I hear this, I can’t help feeling just a little bit envious… but I wouldn’t want to do without this dinosaur of a show, still defiantly calling itself “The World’s Greatest IT Fair”.

For instance, one thing that was completely missed by the non-CeBIT brigade this year was the opening event, which was honoured with the presence of Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel, the French President Nicolas Sarkozy, the European Commission President José Manuel Barroso and Microsoft’s Chief Executive Steve Ballmer. Quite a line-up!

On saying that, I won’t comment on the German Chancellor’s pronouncement that, “it will take another one or two generations for computing to become as much second nature as motoring” – clearly, she’s not exactly an IT specialist...

This year, the trendy subject of “green IT” was everywhere, with an amazing amount of vendors focusing on issues such as energy consumption and recycling, or are at least pretending to do so. It should be interesting to see over the next few years who actually turns their words into action...

Other trends included much use of the word “virtualisation”, and all online activities being promoted under the banner of “Web 2.0”. And as always, there was no shortage of eye-boggling abbreviations – such as SOA, BI and PLM – which are so popular in our industry, but totally unintelligible to ordinary mortals.

My main problem with the exhibition this year was that the gigantic Hall 1 with its confusing roof ‘bunkers’ caused so many of us to be late for meetings. With its maze of aisles, Hall 1 rapidly turned into an adventure playground. Rumour has it that when a number of stands were dismantled, two journalists were discovered who had lost their way while trying to find the WordPerfect stand in 1995. Apparently, they had somehow managed to live on Cola and crackers among the remains of a long-lost software company which had disappeared in the take-over swamps of the nineties...

Of course, post-CeBIT always means pre-CeBIT, because while I’ve somehow managed to survive Hanover and its trade fair once again, I have no illusions about this being my last visit. Next year will undoubtedly see a repeat performance of everything that goes with it: congestion on the motorway, overpriced private accommodation in identical Lego-style red-brick bungalows, a tiny number of hotel rooms, crowded restaurants serving lousy food, awful weather, missed appointments and grumpy journalists.  They’ll all be there – as every year. Q.E.D...

Does fraud protection really need to be this complicated?

By Ryan Whelan

This week, the Association of Payment Clearing Services (Apacs) released figures announcing that fraud on credit and debit cards soared by 25% last year and reached a record high, with losses of £535m.  Card Not Present (CNP) fraud now amounts to more than half of all such losses at £291m.

We’re led to believe the banks are doing everything in their power to protect our money and identities, but most of us know of at least one person that has fallen victim to credit or debit card fraud, if not actually experienced it first-hand.  In fact, only last week I received a call from my mother telling me that money had been taken from her account and spent in China – but of course, she’s never been to China!

Coincidentally, my mother has the dubious pleasure of banking with Barclays, which has recently issued all of its customers with PINsentry - a real step forward in online security, claims Barclays.  I would beg to differ, as I’m sure would most Barclays customers.  It is so ‘secure’ that even the holder of the account cannot access their funds without possession of both the calculator lookalike device and their card, which does not bode well in a world where our pockets are already filled with mobile phones, wallets, keys and MP3 players. 

PINsentry works by asking the user to insert their card and PIN code, and in return they are provided with a one-time eight digit code to log on with.  As with many of the new methods being introduced, including SecureCode by Mastercard and Verified by Visa from Visa, PINsentry might add a small layer of additional security, but in doing so it also compromises usability. 

This method has also forced a number of users to resort to pre-generating and carrying around a set of valid codes for when they are not at home – which is hardly great from a security point of view either.   The emphasis here appears to be solely on blocking fraudsters rather that making life simple and more secure for the account holder. 

Chip and PIN may have tackled fraud at the checkout, but it’s clearly failing to keep up with trends in online shopping.  As such, we are currently forced to use two methods to authenticate ourselves; Chip and PIN on the high street and 'fixed' password-based systems online.

Yet Apacs appears to still be promoting Chip and PIN as the catch-all answer to fraud despite the revelation by Cambridge University researchers of successful attempts to obtain PIN and credit card details by hacking Chip and PIN terminals.

Come on Apacs, wake up, admit defeat, and try finding another solution to fraud that doesn’t just force the problem back on the user!

Majors’ online headache is of their own making

By Rik Salmon

The recent announcement that EMI was set to cut up to 2,000 jobs came as no surprise to many music fans.  While it could be argued that any business willing to pay this man £80million in return for Rudebox deserves everything it gets, the news provided further fuel to the supposed ‘death of the music industry’ tale we keep hearing so much about.

Ever since the early 1990s, the public has had to pay upwards of ten pounds for an album on CD, because no other option was available.  The record labels were all too aware of this and happily maintained the status quo. The rise of high speed broadband connections in the home, however, has shifted the power back into the hands of the consumer.

With the Big Four labels now frantically pointing fingers and sending the BPI scuttling out to do their bidding, the rise of online music downloads has predictably been credited as the primary factor in a downturn in profits. But is it just the case that the majors were simply too slow in reacting to a shift in consumer behaviour, and are now paying the price for not establishing an online presence sooner?

As they belatedly arrive years behind everyone else screaming foul play, they would have us believe that ‘illegal downloads’ are contributing to the demise of a much loved art form.  But is the music industry really in such a bad state?

For years now, independent labels have led the way by adapting to the market and actively working alongside music bloggers, sending them new releases to be hosted free of charge online for an ever-growing community.  It is this kind of proactive and forward thinking action that has enabled the independents to move with the times, whereas the majors maintain their defensive and uncooperative stance.

With recent developments such as Radiohead’s pay-what-you-like release of In Rainbows, and Prince’s free album giveaway with hip taste-maker the Sunday Mail in support of an unprecedented run of 21 dates at London’s 02 Arena, it is now clear that artists are regaining control and exploring other more lucrative revenue streams than traditional music releases. 

So while it’s always regrettable for people to lose their jobs, it’s hard to feel too much sympathy for the crumbling super powers of the music industry because they’ve been lining their pockets for quite long enough.