John Pescatore

Unlike others, I did not postpone travel to Texas this week. After seeing TV pictures of floods in North Dakota, blizzards in Colorado and tornadoes in Louisiana, hard to complain about my bumpy and delayed flights

Anyway, after a bit of exciting rerouting through Oklahoma City, I did get to Texas and met with security folks at some large companies that are Gartner clients. Payment Card Industry compliance issues were major topics as usual, and, as usual, I shoe-horned in warnings about being proactive in dealing with the rampant botnet threat. What I enjoyed the most was working with two very different companies (one in retail, one in transportation) and seeing how actively they were dealing with real world business security issues.

Whether in sports or in security, it is always good to see real teams in action. It was sort of like watching the people in Fargo say “OK, they say there will be a 41 foot crest on the Red River, so let’s get busy piling sandbags up to 43 feet” vs. seeing the news reports of the homeowners with flooded houses who were once again surprised by the spring floods.

Now, today I’m in Atlanta giving a talk to a government conference where they do not allow the use of USB drives, so had to burn my presentation on a CD… Ah, the contrasts of life!