Secunia has updated its Personal Software Inspector (PSI) with the ability to silently download and apply patches from multiple vendors soon after their release. PSI 2.0 is now available in an open beta test,

Alongside the failure of security software to detect an exploit or a piece of malicious software, missing patches remain a significant reason why computers become infected with bad code. Cybercriminals are increasingly probing third-party applications to find a way to take over computers.

Secunia looked at the top 50 programs used by its more than two million users. Twenty-six of those programs are made by Microsoft, which uses an auto-update mechanism to distribute patches on the second Tuesday of the month. Of the 420 or so vulnerabilities found in those 50 programs in 2009, about 35 percent of those were Microsoft programs, said Stefan Frei, research analyst director for the company.

The rest were in third-party applications from Adobe Systems, Apple and others, which use up to 13 different update mechanisms for the remaining 65 percent of vulnerabilities found in the 24 applications, Frei said.

Many of those applications have auto-update mechanisms, but none have uniform schedules for checking for new patches, Frei said. That leaves a window of opportunity for cybercriminals.

“This clearly shows why cybercrime is happening,” Frei said. “They [cybercriminals] don’t need Microsoft.”

Even with diligent patching, there are “lots of users who have one, two, three apps that are not patched,” Frei said.

In 2009, Secunia proposed to software vendors to create a common protocol that all vendors could use in order to get patches distributed faster. No agreement was reached, Frei said.

As a result, Secunia figured out the “secret sauce” to silently auto-update many applications in PSI 2.0. “This works for quite a few applications, and we are increasing the number of applications we can support,” Frei said. “If the vendor releases the patch in a way that we can automate the download of the installation, it works.”

PSI takes an inventory of applications on a person’s computer and their version number. It then checks in with Secunia several times a day to see if a new patch has been released, which is the default configuration for the application although users can turn it off. Secunia recommends leaving PSI run in the background, as it is a lightweight application, Frei said.

Since PSI 2.0 was released a couple of days ago, more than 6,500 people have downloaded it and more than 10,000 patches have been installed. Most users need at least one patch. The number of downloads of PSI and patch installs was surprising, Frei said.

“We were astonished after 24 hours when we looked at the data,” he said.

Secunia recorded more than 2,000 installations of patches for Adobe’s Flash Player and more than 1,000 for Adobe Reader. Other most frequently patched applications from the sample set included Sun’s Java JRE, Adobe Air, Irfan View, the Opera Web browser, Skype, Wireshark and the Firefox browser, according to Secunia’s blog.

Source:http://www.pcworld.com/article/204804/security_program_automatically_tracks_down_missing_patches.html?tk=rss_news

You can succeed in gaining control of open Source in your company and still enjoy the benefits.

You can also gain significant management control over open source software use in your development organization.

Today, many IT executives, enterprise architects, and development managers in leading companies have gained management control over the externally-sourced software used by their application development groups.

They are ensuring compliance and promoting standardization throughout their development teams.

And they’ve done so without slowing the development process or adding overhead burdens to the development team.

This white paper is for IT executives looking to gain control of open source software as part of a multi-source development process.

This paper discusses the five open source management control points: Search, Selection, Approval, Validation and Monitor.

Source:http://www.informationweek.com/whitepaper/Software/Open-Source/taking-control-of-open-source-software-usage-in-y-wp1283436488245;jsessionid=0QU2ISDCTNU25QE1GHPCKH4ATMY32JVN?cid=iwhome_wp_Softw

We scrape the surface on the software that makes up the Xperia X10. Unfortunately, with Android 1.6 preinstalled the X10 is slightly behind the 8-ball.

Sony has stated they will be upgrading the device to Android 2.1 in late September, but there is no word on 2.2.

Sony has however included two custom applications on the X10 that each serve a useful purpose.

Timescape is an application that aggregates the users social networks into one common area.

There is also a Timescape homescreen widget for added convenience. Mediascape on the other hand, brings pictures, videos, and music files into one slick UI.

Source:http://pocketnow.com/android/sony-ericsson-xperia-x10-software-overview-part-1

Below are the top five companies in the Application Software industry as measured by the price to book ratio.

Often companies with the lowest ratio present the greatest value to investors.

Ninetowns Internet Technology Group (NASDAQ:NINE) has a price to book ratio of 0.3x based on a current price of $1.4 and a book value per share of $4.33.

BluePhoenix Solutions (NASDAQ:BPHX) has a price to book ratio of 0.5x based on a current price of $1.59 and a book value per share of $3.43.

ePlus (NASDAQ:PLUS) has a price to book ratio of 0.8x based on a current price of $18.13 and a book value per share of $23.41.

Peerless Systems (NASDAQ:PRLS) has a price to book ratio of 1x based on a current price of $3.2 and a book value per share of $3.32.

Ulticom (NASDAQ:ULCM) has a price to book ratio of 1x based on a current price of $8.23 and a book value per share of $8.34.

SmarTrend is bullish on shares of PRLS and our subscribers were alerted to Buy on August 27, 2010 at $3.16. The stock has risen 1.3% since the alert was issued.

Source:http://www.mysmartrend.com/news-briefs/news-watch/top-5-companies-application-software-industry-offering-investors-best-value-n