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November 12, 2001

In this Issue:

Security Conscious

Biometrics Presents Complex Challenges

In Brief

High-level news at a glance

Managing Change. Enterprise change management solutions provider Merant has selected Gerald Perkel as its new president and CEO. Formerly president of Xerox Corp.'s Office Printing Business, Perkel succeeds retiring executive Gary Greenfield. Merant is also adding Web content management tools obtained through its acquisition of NetObjects' Enterprise Division to its PVCS change management product portfolio.

Patent Battle. Business Objects SA claimed a victory in its patent infringement lawsuit against rival business intelligence vendor Cognos Inc. In September, the U.S. District Court denied Cognos' motion for a partial summary judgment and said the case should proceed to a jury trial in May 2002. In 1999, Business Objects settled a similar lawsuit with Brio Technology Inc. after Brio paid the company $10 million.

DB2 Tools. IBM has announced late 2001 availability for 17 new and upgraded data management tools for DB2 Universal Database and Information Management System (IMS) on z/OS, which extends OS/390 to IBM's zSeries eServers. IBM's new tools include DB2 Buffer Pool Analyzer, DB2 Data Export Facility, IMS Network Compression Facility, and IMS HP Change Accumulation. IBM also updated DB2 Table Editor 4.2 and DB2 Web Query Tool 1.2.

The recent East Coast terrorist attacks roused public awareness of biometrics - facial recognition, fingerprint identification, retinal scanning technology, and so forth - with many calling for its deployment as a way to increase airport security. However, the challenges of properly implementing biometric technology and process infrastructures are similar to those companies face when deploying enterprisewide business intelligence (BI) systems.

One of the biggest problems with biometric security systems is that they need a centralized database of biometric information on known offenders to use when comparing incoming data from passenger scans. Although domestic and international intelligence agencies maintain records, a common database doesn't exist.

According to Jose Granado, Ernst & Young (E&Y) partner in Security and Technology Systems, "The challenge in linking various government databases is that each has different levels of security." Granado also doubts that international agencies would be willing to completely share their records, which contain sensitive information, with each other.

Mark Moore, also an E&Y security systems partner, suggests a more practical solution. Disparate organizations could access a neutral database containing biometric information on airplane passengers to identify suspects on a watch list. Moore added, "When you fly, you are required to show a photo ID as a unique identifier already. This would just be stronger authentication."

Moore strongly believes that there would have to be certain rules to prevent abuse of biometric data and address privacy concerns. "As with search and seizure laws, you would have to specify that you can't use [data] for a fishing expedition. The system would just provide the biometric parameters, not the name, address, and so forth, unless a match was made," Moore said.

Granado foresees the need for biometric databases to change not just by the minute but also by the second, placing a lot of pressure on users to get the latest information into the database quickly.

Both Granado and Moore agree that organizations could use existing storage, communication, and interoperability technology to upgrade security checkpoints. They said that addressing redundancy, high-availability issues, and other infrastructure requirements would be no different from what Global 500 companies face on other projects.

— Michelle Nichols

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