PowerTech, a security solutions provider for IBM Power Systems servers running IBM i, has announced the release of the 2012 State of IBM i Security Study. PowerTech publishes the annual study to help users understand the common security exposures found on IBM i servers.

Each year, PowerTech performs hundreds of compliance assessment audits on IBM i servers of varying sizes and across multiple industries, including financial, retail, and manufacturing. This ninth annual study summarizes data from security audits performed January to December 2011.

The 2012 study shows many of the same vulnerabilities seen in previous years, including:

• 74.6 percent of IBM i servers have 20 or more active *ALLOBJ profiles
• 81 percent of systems unknowingly make *CHANGE the default create authority for library objects
• 66 percent of systems don’t monitor network access to their critical data
• 11 percent of user profiles have a password that matches the user’s name; 54 percent of these are enabled

Robin Tatam, PowerTech director of Security Technologies, says, “Each year we publish this study I expect to see the trends improve. In 2012, we continue to see systems that are vulnerable due to too many powerful users, too few controls for *PUBLIC access to libraries, little or no visibility to network traffic, and not enough auditing.”

The 2012 State of IBM i Security study is available as a free download from http://www.powertech.com. PowerTech also is offering a webinar on the State of IBM i Security on Wednesday, May 30.

PowerTech is your security expert in managing evolving compliance and data privacy threats with automated security solutions for IBM Midrange Servers. Our ServerProven security solutions are straightforward and save your valuable IT resources, giving you ongoing protection and peace of mind.   Because IBM Power System (iSeries and AS/400) servers are used to host particularly sensitive corporate data, it is imperative that you practice proactive compliance security. As an IBM Advanced Business Partner with over 1,000 customers worldwide, PowerTech understands corporate vulnerability and the risks associated with data privacy and access control.   Eden Prairie, Minnesota-based PowerTech Group was founded by security experts in 1996. In 2004, PowerTech was awarded the prestigious Industry Driver APEX Award from iSeries NEWS. That same year, PowerTech also won the APEX award as the Editor’s Choice in the Security category. PowerTech is also the only iSeries security company to have been recognized as a finalist in the IBM Beacon awards.

The PowerTech security solutions provide definitive security coverage for iSeries and AS/400 systems.