Pingdom is out with a new analysis piece looking at physical security over hacking. It’s easy for us to try to prevent hacker attempts, viruses and worms, but what about actual physical security? We just moved HTMLCenter to a new host a couple of weeks ago. Never once did I ask or think about what’s their actual physical security model.
The real issue isn’t the stolen servers, it’s the stolen data. The data is always worth more than the hardware itself.
One Response
For my personal sites, physical security has never been something about which I’ve worried. However, when we were receiving bids for our new server at work, that was a big concern for us. Our security manager asked quite a few questions about the physical security of our server and our data, and we were satisfied with the answers that were provided.
In some cases, the server areas are so secure that even the bigwigs cannot gain access without a classified escort. That’s what we were looking for.
If you’re not handling any sensitive information, physical security isn’t all that important. However, if you’re going to be housing credit card numbers, social security numbers or other highly personal information, it should be just as important as the software security.
After all, what good is a firewall if someone walks in and steals the computer on which your Web site is running (or, even worse, steals the backup tapes of your server)?