Chief executives and chief financial officers know that viruses can damage their businesses and cost millions.

But many do not realise that antivirus software alone will not help when it comes to the increasingly frequent flaws that are being exposed in corporate software.

The biggest threat to security are these flaws, which demand instant attention and patching. IT teams spend more than $2bn a year trying to patch up these network security flaws, according to analyst Aberdeen Group.

But still the process of security patch management is not being understood at the level that really matters: in the boardroom.

As we become even more reliant on IT, it is all the more necessary to have procedures in place to minimise system downtime and ensure the security and availability of information across the organisation.

By Paul Butler at vnunet.

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