Raft of initiatives explore non-proprietary routes to better IT security
The Cabinet Office's Central Sponsor for Information Assurance, which co-ordinates information security projects across government, is investigating applications based around a highly secure open source operating system.
The proof-of-concept systems being developed by the CSIA will use security enhanced Linux to support remote working and web services.
Ministers were prompted to disclose details of the work following parliamentary questions tabled by Lord Harris of Haringey about the CSIA's activities in evaluating the security of open source software.
Responding on behalf of the Government, Lord Bassam said the unit was also sponsoring work at CESG, the Government's information assurance facility at GCHQ.
"Among a range of IA capabilities being investigated is the future 'trusted computing platform'," he added.
Lord Bassam said this included the open source Xen software, a project developed relatively recently by Cambridge University, which allows a single computer to run multiple operating systems and is being hailed as a potential IT security breakthrough.
The news follows the recent announcement that the Department of Trade and Industry is providing £132,000 of funding to open source consultancy netproject for the further development of secure, centrally-managed Linux-based operating system.
The initiative, known as the Secure Open Desktop Architecture (SODA), grew out of work by netproject for PITO, the Police Information Technology Organisation (PITO).
Members of netproject's Incubator Club, a group set up for public and private sector organisations considering migrating to open source, will match the DTI's R&D grant.
The work carried out by the Government-funded projects is distinct from a further initiative which forms part of the Open Source Academy venture supported by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister.
The National Computing Centre also announced on 17 June the launch of the Open Source Laboratory, a currently free facility allowing public sector organisations to evaluate open source solutions in a test environment, avoiding the risk to their corporate IT infrastructure.
The Laboratory's first user is Cheshire County Council, which will be conducting trials of a joint proprietary and open source desktop platform.
Against this activity, US software giant Microsoft on 23 June highlight recent research which the company says shows that on a per-event basis, its Windows platform is cheaper and quicker to patch than a similar open source environment.
Related Links
Central Sponsor for Information Assurance.
Send your comments on this article to editor@egovmonitor.com
