It's incredible that in this day and age some of the most popular security products, products that are marketed as protecting you from the evils of computers, are so badly designed. CheckPoint's FireWall-1, the leading firewall by market share, had . . .
It's incredible that in this day and age some of the most popular security products, products that are marketed as protecting you from the evils of computers, are so badly designed. CheckPoint's FireWall-1, the leading firewall by market share, had at least four vulnerabilities reported this year, and at least eleven reported last year.

My intention is not to berate or point the finger at these companies. But one has to wonder, if vendors that specialize in security can't produce a secure product, what chance does any other software vendor have? And before you mention open source as a solution, consider its track record. With some exceptions, it's not much better..

Writing secure code is hard; designing a security product harder. They both require a lot of time, effort, and money. Complexity only makes things more difficult. All these factors are working against security.

Complexity is increased in each revision of the software by adding more features. Time to market is essential to the commercial success of the products, and is shrinking all the time. Each product is made with as little money as possible, so as to increase its return, and allow the vendor to price it at a level customers will buy. Customers are always asking for more features, as soon as possible, and for a cheaper product.

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