Collective Benefit

Even more so than with other business issues one would anticipate that corporate security concerns would bias corporations toward non-disclosure and confidentiality however InfraGard, an information sharing and analysis effort sponsored by the FBI that serves the interests and combines the knowledge base of a wide range of members throws this conventional wisdom "out the window."

At the recent annual meeting of Infragard's New England Chapter the benefits of collaboration were clearly articulated by the session presenters. Quotes from the meeting included:

• "The collective view is more powerful."
• "Collaboration and cooperation"
• "Strength in numbers"
• "Most valuable interactions are those among peer groups."

Infragard is not the only collaborative example in the security realm. The SANS Institute is another fine example of the benefits of information sharing, in this case to communicate vulnerability information and disseminate educational material. Even the tools used in the security space leverage open source resources; the majority of intrusion detection systems deployed worldwide capitalize on SNORT, the open source intrusion detection and prevention system.

The risk/benefits of information sharing must always be weighted however, as we see in the security arena, the benefits of accelerated action and improved performance in many instances will justify a corporation's policy towards openness and collaboration.