Mobile security growing fast

Mobile security is fast becoming big business, according to a new International Data Corporation (IDC) study. It says the industry was worth more than $75 million last year and it expects this to exceed $1 billion by 2006. A number of factors are expected to contribute to this growth, including the rapidly developing wireless standards and the growing reliance of consumers on the flexibility offered by mobile computing. Pinning the estimated compound annual growth rate at close to 70% in the next four years, the IDC says enterprise clients and their demands for mobile software will drive the real growth in the market in the coming year.

Gene Kan, one of the key programmers behind the file-sharing application Gnutella, has committed suicide. San Francisco police reported that he had shot himself in his California home. Kan, who was 25, and his fellow programmers did not create Gnutella, but tweaked the Gnutella protocol so it could be replicated by other programmers around the world, unleashing massive music, video and software file sharing. Kan, who came to be known as the unofficial spokesman for Gnutella, often said the technology differed from Napster because it had no company to sue or central computer to shut down.

Intranet developers and Web site owners can now include the latest virus threat information on their sites with Sophos` daily virus feed service. Anti-virus vendor Sophos says it is trying to boost awareness of virus threats with the service which includes live display of the most recent worms and viruses. The virus information offered by the company includes lists of the most common viruses, the newest viruses as well as the most common virus hoaxes doing the rounds.

Sources: Reuters, PRNewswire.

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