Improve Security and Compliance: Get the Details

Windows Vista provides multiple layers of protection to help your company address the risk and expense associated with security and regulatory compliance. Your protection begins with an operating system that places security in the forefront of its design. Layers of protection help guard against external attacks, internal threats, and access to sensitive information. And should you ever need to recover data, Windows Vista helps ensure your backups are current and reliable. Sophisticated auditing tools improve your ability to comply with corporate reporting requirements—and enhanced data protection, anti-phishing, and anti-malware capabilities help protect your enterprise.

Engineered for security

Windows Vista is the first version of the Windows client to be developed end-to-end using Microsoft's Security Development Lifecycle. This makes security a top priority from the start by defining an engineering process that every developer must follow, and that must be verified prior to the release of the operating system.

Working to ensure a more secure end-to-end computing environment, Microsoft is working toward Common Criteria (CC) certification. Windows Vista will be independently tested in third-party labs using criteria set by the International Standards Organization (ISO), with the goal of achieving an Evaluated Assurance Level 4 (EAL4) and Single Level OS Protection Profile certifications. Together, these high standards for excellence and new security improvements at the architectural level make Windows Vista the most secure version of Windows yet.

Security: Design features

	Feature Name	Function

	Security Development Lifecycle	Makes security a priority from the start of the development lifecycle with repeatable processes that each engineer must follow.
	Windows Service Hardening	Helps keep your system safer by preventing critical Windows services from being used for abnormal activity in the file system, registry, or network.

Protecting against threats and vulnerabilities

To safeguard your organization's data from external threats, Windows Vista provides a major step forward in browser security and privacy protection with Internet Explorer 7. Configured to run in Protected Mode, Internet Explorer 7 allows users to browse the web but restricts modifications to user files or settings. As a result, even if a malicious external site finds a potential vulnerability, the site has limited opportunities to damage your employee's PC.

Windows Defender, an integrated component of Windows Vista, helps block, control, and remove spyware and other potentially unwanted software. Additionally, your IT department can more easily ensure wireless networks are secure with an assortment of security enhancements, including support for the latest and most secure wireless networking protocol, Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 (WPA2).

To add a further layer of protection from external attacks, Microsoft continues to improve its Windows Firewall. For example, the bi-directional, application-aware filtering helps prevent distributed denial-of-service attacks.

Security: Online features

	Feature Name	Function

	Internet Explorer protected mode	Helps protect users from malicious websites by restricting the browser's ability to modify user or system files and settings.
	Windows Defender	Helps protect your company's PCs by regularly scanning your computers and offering to remove any spyware or other unwanted software that it finds.
	Windows Firewall with Advanced Security	Provides advanced new capabilities to help better protect your network and your PCs from malicious attacks.

Enable secure access to information

Windows Vista User Account Control helps protect corporate resources by allowing you to better manage operations requiring administrative privileges. You can run individual users at the lowest required level to reduce the risk of potential vulnerabilities to the operating system. Individual application privileges also let standard users change common settings without compromising security—and without spending time searching for a manager or IT staff person who has administrative rights.

Windows Vista allows you to monitor entry to restricted resources and records, helping to ensure security and meet compliance requirements while containing cost. Additionally, improvements to strong authentication via smartcards and new platform capabilities allow third parties to more easily adopt new authentication methods.

Security: Information access features

	Feature Name	Function

	User Account Control	Increases security and improves total cost of ownership by reducing the need for users to work in administrator mode to be productive.
	New Logon Architecture	Delivers an improved authentication infrastructure that enables independent software vendors (ISVs) and organizations to implement their own authentication methods, such as biometrics or tokens, by writing credential providers.
	Network Access Protection	Restricts clients that lack current security updates or virus signatures from the network when used with Windows Server code-name "Longhorn."
	New Smartcard Infrastructure	Improves the flexibility of smartcard infrastructures by including drives for common smartcard readers and updates to Cryptographic Service Provider (CSP) modules via Windows Update.

Protect and recover information

Windows Vista helps you keep data confidential by supporting data encryption at the disk, directory, or file level. Your company can assign whatever level of protection makes sense for your people and their computer use. Enhanced group policies help restrict the installation of potentially harmful hardware, while allowing you to better control who uses removable storage devices (such as USB flash memory drives)—reducing the risk of corporate data and intellectual property loss.

Security: Data protection features

	Feature Name	Function

	Windows BitLocker™ Drive Encryption	Provides full-volume encryption and boot integrity checking to help ensure that the data on a company computer stays confidential, even if the PC is lost, stolen, or decommissioned.
	Windows Rights Management Services Client	Helps enterprise customers control and protect critical digital information that is shared with other users.
	Encrypting File System	Keeps data more secure even on shared computers by encrypting the files of each user.
	Group Policy for Device Installation	Helps block the installation of removable storage devices, such as USB flash drives and external hard drives, helping to prevent corporate intellectual property or sensitive data from being compromised or stolen.