InformationWeek

Content-specific security refers to protecting networks from any unwanted content or code. Fortunately, tools are available to help network managers filter out these potential threats. The most widely used tools are content filters, URL filters, and virus-detection software. Companies can buy these products off the shelf and do their own deployment or buy them as value-added services from application service providers or Internet service providers.

Perhaps the most controversial of the three tools is content-filtering software. By scanning files using key words or phrases, such software monitors where unwanted content--such as sensitive data or legally actionable words or phrases--originates and is sent. Network managers who don't want the administrative headaches or the imposing "Big Brother'' approach of an internal monitoring tool can outsource content filtering to a company such as AllegroMail.com Inc., a messaging ASP that automatically scans files for key words and phrases that contain profane, pornographic, racial, or sensitive content. The ASP also filters files attached to E-mail by type, so a company could, for example, ensure that a CAD file such as a chip design stays in-house.

Here's how it works: When a user sends a file containing content for which a filter has been established, an error message appears, warning the user that the E-mail contained inappropriate content. Richard Bliss, VP of business development at AllegroMail .com, says employees are less likely to send malicious, illegal, or sexually explicit content through the enterprise if they know their company is using content filters.

Authentica Inc., another vendor in this market, is attacking content filtering on another level. The company's PageVault software puts the user in control of content, limiting what a recipient can access and when. Steve Vigneaux, VP of marketing at Authentica, says the user can also control the use of the content, placing restrictions on printing, copying and pasting, forwarding, and storing.

"Static document control isn't enough. You need dynamic control as well," Vigneaux says. For example, if a company is launching a product, it will want people to access certain types of information at different times in the product's life cycle. PageVault lets a company set that up ahead of time so that at certain critical points of the product launch, the information becomes available to the people who need it, he says.

How To Provide Content-Specific Security
Type Content filter	Description Filters files, E-mail, or Web pages using key words or phrases	Vendors GuardOne.com, RuleSpace, SmartStuff Software
URL filter	Filters URLs, blocking access to certain Web pages	Secure Computing, Symantec, Websense
Virus detector	Detects viruses and treats infected systems	McAfee, Symantec, Trend Micro
DATA: INTERNETWEEK

Weaving a time limit into documents can also help curb misuse of information by former employees, Vigneaux says. "One of the most common security errors is forgetting to retire user IDs of past employees," he says. "If you expire documents by a certain date, you can be sure that no one can access them, particularly past employees."

Quality Letters of Credit Inc., which provides guaranteed letters of credit for international trade, is using Authentica's PageVault to cut international trade document exchange from three days to 15 seconds. Quality Letters works with freight forwarders and international banks such as First Union Corp. so companies can sell products abroad without worrying about the payment process.

"When you work with banks and financial institutions, you have to be very diligent about security," says David Clements, president of the San Carlos, Calif., company. "In two mouse clicks, PageVault can save a document as a PDF file, sign it digitally, and send it to a secure repository. I control who sees what document when, which is important because my customers need to know their data is secure."

Quality Letters is testing PageVault and intends to go live this week. When it does, its partners and customers will be able to view letters of credit using a Web browser and an Adobe Acrobat viewer.

URL filtering, another form of security, is becoming more common among companies because employee access to the Internet can potentially mean day trading, visits to X-rated sites, and other types of searching that aren't related to work. To curb this kind of activity, some companies have installed proxy servers that block URLs or track which users go to which sites.

"There are two issues companies have with Web-site access: productivity loss and legal implications," says Steve Trilling, director of research at Symantec Corp.'s AntiVirus Research Center in Los Angeles. The good news, he says, is that there are tools that can help protect companies from both.