Crypto geek Security causes lack of usability

Crypto geek Security causes lack of usability

Usability of security software is partly to blame for low protection 


levels in many computers, according to international security experts.


In a panel session at this year's Australian Unix Users Group (AUUG) 


conference in Melbourne yesterday, software security developers gave 


reasons why the IT industry is still at the mercy of so many problems.


University of Auckland computer scientist Peter Gutmann said many 


security standards were written 10 years ago and have mostly just been 


tweaked since then.


"A lot of the security stuff is designed by crypto geeks [and] because 


of a lack of usability, people can't apply them correctly," Gutmann 


said, adding usability is just as important as "having a bunch of crypto 


and let people figure it out from there".


Gutmann said the protocols were designed without usability and even if a 


user-friendly GUI could be put over it, it is unlikely the original 


developers would accept it.


"They would rather have 100 percent perfect software that's unusable 


than 99 percent perfect software that is usable," he said.


OpenBSD developer Ryan McBride, who works on packet filter and IPSec 


code, lashed out at intrusion detection systems, saying the technique 


has no way of detecting whether a virus is attacking a network.


"I do IDS work in a Fortune 50 company and it's a case of 'oh look, 


another box has a virus - go turn it off'," McBride said. "It's very 


hard to automate turning things off in security."


McBride said IDS isn't the place to solve the problem, but inside the 


software is.


University of NSW School of IT senior lecturer, Dr Lawrie Brown said 


when looking at modern software, part of the problem is the enormous 


body of un-safe software that people continue to use, which propagates 


vulnerabilites.


Brown said there is also a mindset within the general population that 


computers are relatively new and people are unaccustomed to the 


importance of information security.


German network security PhD student Tobias Eggendorfer seconded this by 


saying end users are not educated to deal with security threats.


"It will take 20 to 30 years to educate people about computer security," 


he said. "You wouldn't give your house key to someone, so why do the 


same with your password."

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