Norton and Broadcom To Develop Connected Home Anti-Virus Platform

Norton has announced plans to develop a more holistic virus solution for the future connected home and it appliances.  Through the project codenamed, “Apollo”, Symantec's Norton Labs is collaborating with Broadcom the chip manufacture to develop a new security solution for the home. The security software will be pre-built into Broadcom’s based router devices to protect from the gateway.

According to Norton Labs' Distinguished Engineer, Shaun Cooley "The solution will be built into the router because the router is always on; it is never switched off".

Most of the appliances we buy today and in the near future will be classified as smart, and as such have their own operation system, with the added functionality of connecting to the internet – all five-billion by 2014.  This means that they are susceptible to viruses and malwares of some sort.

"In the future, security will have to move from securing a specific device (typically a PC) to securing a home network, as well as securing devices under multiple operating systems. Ideally, the consumer could have a common interface to configure security that maps out the overall network rather than needing to understand each device's specific configuration settings," says Sam Rosen, practice director - TV & Video, Broadband and Connected Home at ABI Research.

Hacking into your refrigerator's computer to send spam is one thing. "Someone could develop a vulnerability attack and change the physical appliance from operating correctly in the first place," says Lawrence Pingree, research director of security technologies at Gartner.