This traditional year-end greeting, or a similar variation, has been used for centuries to wish others good fortune in the new year. In today’s world, however, it may be a more appropriate wish for non-human systems that also need to remain healthy, alive, and profitable. Some of the better known pathogens for both machines and humans originate in Asia and provide an excellent basis for comparison. The Asian Flu is the most recognizable human malady, and leading the list for system pathogens and intrusions are attacks from China and North Korea. 

Prior to flu season, humans are advised to be vaccinated for the latest strain and to avoid other people during flu season whenever possible. If you do come in contact, washing your hands ASAP is recommended. Of course wearing a HazMat suit would also work, but would be a very uncomfortable solution. In the technology world firewalls are like invisible HazMat suits and are much less cumbersome. Security applications like Norton are similar to the protection provided by a flu shot. Running scans and washing your hands frequently are virtually identical strategies.  

Unfortunately the malware and viruses that infect machines can become resistant to the techno-biotics faster than human viruses become antibiotic resistant. The reason for this is simple.  Human pathogens like the Asian Flu mutate randomly, so most mutations are harmless and fail.  Technology pathogens have human intelligence driving the modifications so the process is much quicker and targeted. Author Joseph Heller’s advice in Catch-22 – “Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you.” – definitely applies here.

Fortunately, one major difference between humans and machines renders the machines virtually immortal. Although genetic copies of humans are not yet possible, machines and their intelligence can be cloned easily or totally live full-time in the cloud as hosted solutions. Think of lying on your back in a field and looking up at the clouds and dreaming you are sitting in one.  That would render you virtually invulnerable to the pathogens down on Earth. Let your machines live the dream and give them a happy, healthy, and prosperous new year by migrating to the cloud.

Dreaming of warm winter weather, attend ITEXPO 2016, Jan. 25 - 28, 2016 at the Greater Ft. Lauderdale/Broward County Convention Center in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., to live the dream. 

Max Schroeder (News - Alert) is vice president emeritus of FaxCore Inc. (www.faxcore.com ). Rich Tehrani is the CEO and group editor-in-chief at TMC (www.tmcnet.com), and conference chairman of ITEXPO (News - Alert) (www.itexpo.tmcnet.com).