The StillSecure Security Alert Team (SAT) compiles the top 10 network vulnerabilities on a monthly basis, pulling from CVSS and other public scoring organizations. We also take into account customer feedback, inquiries, and public and private monitoring and analyses. Here's what was on the radar in early March:

The January release of Strata Guard, our award-winning intrusion detection/prevention system (IDS/IPS), sent a seismic shock through the network security industry. The combination of performance and price that this new version of Strata Guard delivers is unprecedented.

Strata Guard is the first high-speed (up to 4 Gigs per second), multi-segment IDS/IPS that starts at $2,500 per Gig of throughput. That's one-third to one-quarter of what the other guys are charging.

How do we do it? Our big-brain engineers came up with the MG Accelerator™ (patent pending), our proprietary technology that allows off-the-shelf hardware to achieve lightning-fast processing speeds. Previously, such speeds were only available using custom designed processors and hardware, which is expensive stuff—ergo, the astronomical prices of other high-speed systems on the market.

And Strata Guard's multi-segment monitoring capabilities make a terrific value even better, as a single Strata Guard node can analyze traffic on up to four network segments simultaneously. A node can be deployed in IDS mode, IPS mode, or a blend of the two on a segment-by-segment basis.

Be sure to take a look at our Jump Start 09 Strata Guard promotion, which offers up to 50% off the retail price. You need to do it RIGHT NOW, though, because this ridiculous offer expires on March 31, 2009.

Learn more about the Strata Guard release »

The Conficker worm that began spreading in October 2008 brought back a lot of memories from 2003 when the Blaster worm was released. Conficker is yet another worm exploiting vulnerable Windows devices of all stripes—devices that should never be exposed to the Internet to begin with, and certainly not without proper protection.

Conficker exploits a vulnerability in the Windows RPC service, the same service that allows local file sharing and print sharing, neither of which should ever be enabled on an Internet-connected device without strict security controls. Even default installations of Windows XP Service Pack 2 and 3 get this right. The end user has to enable file and printer sharing, or have it done by the IT folks using Group Policy.

Conficker and Blaster look a lot alike. Both rely on direct connections to the Windows RPC service, and both exploit a buffer overflow. Both can be easily prevented with a basic local or network firewall configuration to deny access to both ports from un-trusted hosts — basically, anywhere outside of your corporate LAN or properly protected home network.

StillSecure can help with Conficker on a number of levels, ranging from prevention to detection. The StillSecure ProtectPoint™ managed firewall service takes a best-practices approach to perimeter security and ensures each deployment, regardless of the type of Internet-based service it is protecting, is properly configured. StillSecure VAM® can help detect new services on the network, such as the HTTP servers that Conficker creates, and bring those to your attention immediately. StillSecure's Strata Guard® IDS/IPS, and StillSecure ProtectPoint Managed IDPS both detect the Conficker worm in addition to valid services on non-standard ports, such as HTTP traffic on port 10000, rather than port 80.

With our acquisition of ProtectPoint, Inc. at the end January, we added managed security services to our slate of network security offerings. This is pretty exciting as it allows us to now offer security in the form that best fits our customers needs: as a hardware, as software, or as an affordable subscription-based managed service.

ProtectPoint, based out of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, is a leading a managed security service provider (MSSP) with a SAS-70 Type II certified, state-of-the-art security operations center (SOC). Fanatical about both security and customer service, ProtectPoint security experts monitor global network activity around the clock for emerging threats and implement the appropriate defenses on customers' networks as threats are identified.

In addition to managed firewall and intrusion detection/prevention (IDS/IPS) services, ProtectPoint offers VPN, content filtering, gateway antivirus, spam filtering, and more.

If your budget is tight, if your IT staff is overworked, or if managing your firewall or IDS/IPS is taking up way too much of your time, you should consider our ProtectPoint managed security service. Learn more at: http://www.stillsecure.com/services/index.php.

Man, we don't mess around. The first new product—our SSL VPN managed service—resulting from our January acquisition of ProtectPoint MSSP has already hit the market, and it brings together the best from both organizations.

The new SSL VPN is an easy-to-use, lightweight option for implementing a VPN service on your network. It is ideal for the "road warrior" scenario where a VPN agent cannot be installed on every endpoint device. The new service supports all major operating systems so it can be easily deployed in most network environments.

The new SSL VPN service complements and extends our existing IPsec site-to-site VPN offering, so now customers can use a combination of the two to ensure end-to-end coverage. The new SSL VPN service utilizes technology from our Cobia™ secure networking platform. Learn more »

We'll be exhibiting at these events in the coming months, so drop by and say hello. We'll even give you a t-shirt or something.