IfWorld Seminar Draws IT Crowd

Kirby Jones, territory sales manager with WatchGuard Technologies Inc. of Seattle, led a presentation about network security at the offices of IfWorld Inc. in Fayetteville on Sept. 14.

The seminar drew information technology professionals from two financial companies, a mortgage company, a real estate company and a civic entity. Several attendees requested anonymity so would-be hackers won’t be tipped off as to what products they use or may use in the future.

Jones, whose office is in Dallas, said anyone on the Internet is a potential target for a network breach. He told the story of one small company in Texas that unwittingly housed three full-length movies on its server — 100 gigabytes of information — and didn’t know it. The company found out about the movies because it couldn’t receive e-mail as the server got too full, he said.

Jones’ recommendations for WatchGuard products aside, he said a layered approach to protecting a network is essential, including a state-of-the-art firewall, antivirus protection, content filtering and spam blocking.

Jeremy Webb, co-owner of IfWorld, said a decent network security system can run $2,000, which is expensive for many small businesses. But it’s something he tries to emphasis to customers.

“It’s a lot like life insurance,” he said.