Gartner: Cloud computing, mobile ushering in "major shift" for enterprise security practices

Gartner anticipates turbulence ,upheaval in IT security vendor landscape

Gartner Thursday held forth on what it expects to be the top security trends for 2013, citing the rise of cloud computing, social media and employees bringing their own devices to work as among the forces likely to produce radical changes in how enterprises manage IT security. The market research firm also says the "major shift" expected in IT security in 2013 will shake up established IT security vendors as newer players in cloud and mobile challenge them.

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Earl Perkins, Gartner research vice president, said during a webinar with clients that the forces cited above, as well as an "information explosion" in the enterprise, are putting enormous pressure on enterprise IT professionals and vendors by "making some of the existing IT infrastructures obsolete." He added: "Will the major providers of security technology be the same ones in three to five years? The answer is probably not."

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Perkins also said the time has also come to acknowledge there's no such thing as "perfect protection" and that the expense of providing security has to be more commensurate with business risk. That means the dialog between IT and the business user about what security is and what "appropriate risk" levels are has to be undertaken in earnest in 2013. Business people are not really interested in operational metrics of IT, such as how effective patching is, Perkins noted. Their idea of metrics involves factors such as effective, secure collaboration with supply-chain partners and the focus should be to those ends.

Ellen Messmer is senior editor at Network World, an IDG publication and website, where she covers news and technology trends related to information security. Twitter: MessmerE. E-mail: emessmer@nww.com.

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