Post-Blog Report: 26 Short Topics about Security

Aloha and welcome to the post-blog report.  Over the last 5 months, I’ve been writing a blog series called, 26 Short Topics about Security and wanted to share some observations.  First, I went about this since there are so many IT challenges when it comes to security and it’s virtually impossible to cover them all.  Plus, I’m always looking for interesting stats and stories pertaining to security and thought I’d gather them up in one place.  It’s sort of a 2009 ‘Security Greatest Hits’ (or Misses, if you’re a Devo fan).

If you are a blogger and sometimes have difficulty producing a consistent stream of valuable conversations, a blog series will do the trick.  You’re not alone since Perseus reports that 66.0% of surveyed blogs had not been updated in two months, "representing 2.72 million blogs that have been either permanently or temporarily abandoned.”  I had a daily urge to continue my quest and keep the flow going rather than jumping on ‘whatever the topic/crisis of the day’ was and writing about that.  Interestingly, the timing of many of the topics coincided with a recent event, so it worked out well.  Specific keywords in the titles, like Firewall, Virtualization, Twitter or any other term that’s hot (frequently searched) drew the most readers even if the title was a little ‘out there.’  And like any writer, I was a little surprised by the entries that got the most attention.  You know the routine, you think something is fantastic but nobody cares and the ones you feel are a little weak get massive reads.  Go figure.

The other thing I tried during this series is to both include a ton of links (Don MacVittie called it a link-fest) to referring stories along with links to the previous stories in the series for easy perusal.  When one got read, so did multiple others which positively influenced Pages per Visit and Average Time on Site – key metrics for any website.  Finally, I’m thinking about recording the blogs to offer an audio version (à la Audio Whitepapers) of the series.

Now to put a bow on this – All 26 Short Topics about Security:

1. 26 Short Topics about Security: Stats, Stories and Suggestions
2. BREACH is the Word, is the Word, is the Word that you Heard….
3. Remember when we drew big Clouds on whiteboards…
4. Decade old Data Centers
5. The Encryption Dance (plus the A Cappella version)
6. Yelling ‘WebApp Firewall’ in a Crowded Data Center
7. Be Our Guest
8. Hacks, Hackers, Hacking
9. Dumpster Diving vs. The Bit Bucket
10. The Threat Behind the Firewall
11. Keys to the Kingdom
12. Brought to you by the Letter L and the Number 7
13. Reduce your Risk
14. Our H1N1 Preparedness Plan (actually counted as 13.5)
15. Can my PAN ride the LAN out the WAN?
16. F5’s BIG-IP system with Oracle Access Manager
17. This time, it’s Personal
18. Don’t say a Word
19. Will you Comply or just Check the Box?
20. Social Media – Friend or Foe
21. IPv6 and the End of the World
22. You’ve Taken That Out of Context
23. Virtualization is Real
24. Windows Shopping
25. X marks the Games
26. It all comes down to YOU - The User
27. Catch some Zzzzzzzzzzzzz

Bonus blog: Bit.ly, Twitter, Security & You

ps