Updated
Our thanks to Ophir of Israel for unearthing this amusing cock-up, courtesy of Symantec. The security software specialist forgot to renew a digital certificate on one of its Web sites.
enterprisesecurity.symantec.com, is designed to act as a showcase for Symantec products, but its Verisign-supplied digital certificate expired last Thursday (April 26).
The site is not ecommerce-enabled and security has been maintained. Or so Symantec says. (Well, you can actually get a secure connection to the site, but this story is about embarrassing a Symantec.) The Enterprise Security Trialware is currently unavailable, while Symantec pays its bill.
A company flack claims that potential customer looking to download trial enterprise security software from the site would still be able to connect over a secure connection. But how can we know? Without that Verisign certificate, Symantec may as well be talking through its hat.
"The expiry of the certificate doesn't mean that the security it was in place to deliver goes away," the Symantec flack says. "This is a minor administrative oversight rather than a security oversight.
"The issue only affects one of our sites," he adds. But how do we know?. If it can't get its act together with one digital certificate, who's to say it can get its act together with a sheaf of the damn things?
Symantec claims that Verisign does not send bills or final demands for renewal of digital certificates. It tells the world+dog instead.
Symantec says it will get in touch with Verisign and pay to renew the certificate. But how can we know that Verisign will accept its money.
You see, Symantec, you may claim to be a security expert. But we can prove that we are insecurity experts. ®
External Links
Symantec's expired certificate