The SoBig and Blaster viruses could be a "blessing in disguise" as they can help IT departments apply a security policy to home users, according to the software manager at the Open University (OU).

Speaking at IDC's Security Conference in London this week, Marilyn Moffat described the security challenges facing the OU, which has more than 7,000 staff and thousands of students around the world interacting with the university via email.

"We have local and remote users. It is OK for guys to work from home but we must protect our core infrastructure," she said.

The OU has a multi-layer antivirus and spam strategy to help keep its messaging infrastructure working continuously, but like many organisations it could not avoid SoBig and Blaster this summer.

[ Read more ]