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SC Magazine — A sure sign of the infosec times

I started reading SC Magazine over 15 years ago, pre-Haymarket, when I started my journey in the information security industry. Back then it was a small publication that gave users and vendors direct insight into emerging security technology, alerts and products. This was at a time when few magazines paid proper attention to the space. The SC Magazine scene seemed to revolve around viruses, passwords, script kiddies, tokens, attacks, warnings and encryption methods, as well as the ever-important SC Magazine product review and shootouts – still a favorite of mine. I looked forward to the monthly issues, which were all about the industry and paid attention to the security innovators; if you had an interesting solution or noteworthy method, your product or approach was given appropriate exposure. SC Magazine continues to spur the industry.

As the industry progressed with more publicized issues, vulnerabilities and DDoS attacks, so did the security practitioner gain greater organizational clout. SC Magazine answered with more poignant editorial centered around trends, practices and use cases – while keeping true to form of introducing new products and advancements. While popular IT publications paid greater attention, it seemed that the number of security startups and categories outpaced most mainstream coverage – except for SC Magazine. Do you remember when next year was the year for PKI and the future of IDS was pronounced as being dead? As a vendor, many of us appreciated the visibility, focus and occasionally being invited to the SC Awards…where else could security vendors congregate, recipients briefly pontificate and the industry self-congratulate (is that discouraged at Blackhat?) – I digress.
 
Today's news is not solely about cyberczars and cyberterrorists, compliance mandates, insider threats, spam and phishing, physical and environmental threats, system integrity, identity theft, a multitude of attack vectors, and the countermeasures to combat the same. The current security landscape is rich and incorporates risk management, governance, process, education, standards, compensating controls, policy, career development and legalities. SC Magazine keeps up with the times by expanding their online edition with multimedia coverage of the key issues, best practices and the latest security advancements thanks to a solid supplement of user, analyst, specialist, vendor and blogger contribution.

News media is consolidating. The information security market has also seen its share of consolidation and slowed growth in the present economic climate -- albeit security still fares better than any other IT industry category. And some security professionals, expertise, credentials and all, may be moved back into the operations mix. But hot technologies (device fingerprinting, application fuzzing and e-discovery?), issues (Is safe harbor and intellectual property the new PCI for data leakage?) and trends (SOC/NOC convergence and security as a service?) provide information security momentum.

What will the future hold for the security market, professional and SC Magazine? We should not be too concerned – we have cloud computing, Windows 7 (I couldn't resist), virtualization, mobile internet, outsourcing, e-health, rich internet apps, organized crime, new release exploits and government defense investments to keep everyone, the practitioner, vendor, end user and SC Magazine, appropriately vigilant.

For me, SC Magazine has been my de facto industry quick-read, and for most, it shall continue to serve as the infosec bellwether. Wishing SC Magazine a thriving 20th b-day from your fans.

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