Market research firm ActivMedia Inc. said that in the coming
year, two-thirds of business sites will acquire or upgrade Web security
systems.
A majority of Web managers already have some level of Web site security in-
place. Still, markets for security features are ready to expand substantially
in the next 12 months, until four in five have security features installed,
the firm said..
The conclusions are from ActivMedia’s 1998 studies, “Selling to B-to-B Website
Managers,” and “Selling to Consumer Website Managers.
the report found that most purchasers will be new consumers of security
technologies, and a solid
majority will purchase them outright.
One relatively new technology that will make a large splash is SET, or Secure
Electronic Transactions. This combination of Certification and Encryption is a
standard for commerce that will allow banks to certify financial transactions
while other trusted third parties certify Vendor and Purchaser identities.
Although few sites currently offer SET and skeptics question its viability,
within the year one in four business-to-business
and three in ten consumer-oriented sites expect to have it in-place,
ActivMedia said.
“The Internet, intranets, extranets. Whatever you want to call this
ever-expanding
increasingly complex Web, it is clear that exposure to outside infiltration is
making business executives and government officials nervous,” said
ActivMedia’s vice president of research Harold Wolhandler.
“And rightly so. The unfolding of this inter-networked open society isn’t
easily controlled.
Hackers and piraters threaten all departments from sales to
engineering. What would happen to your company if someone was able to download
your business plan? The dangers are real, and businesses are quite willing to
spend serious money to protect their assets,” Wolhandler said.
Indeed, the New York Times site
was recently hacked and the damage lasted for days.
Each of the reports is being sold for $1,295 for a single copy or $3,000 for a
site license.
