IT Security: Patent for system to prevent viruses spreading within intranets

"Patented as the "Network information security zone joint defense system," D-Link's ZoneDefense solves the limitation of pre-emptive measures that traditional network security technologies do not provide," says the company. Shame it can't spell "defence" in a UK patent application and shame on the UK Patent Office for accepting a spelling mistake.

But spell-check faux pas aside, the product has the potential to save millions of businesses (and home network users) from the awful realisation that one person on the network has inadvertently infected the entire network.

The company says "ZoneDefense(TM) automatically quarantines infected computers on a network by detecting abnormal behaviour, which violates rules of its network access service. This countermeasure can effectively avoid the spread of viruses to the same subnet or other subnets, as well as preventing attacks from intruders such as hackers who can paralyse critical servers within enterprises."

The system is not new - a similar patent was granted for the same product in Italy during 2009.