Cisco, Microsoft, VMware, and others unite!

The OpenSSL Heartbleed Bug security issue is open-source’s biggest security breach ever!

Cisco, Microsoft, VMware and other tech giants are forming a new project to fund and support critical elements of the global technology: The Core Infrastructure Initiative (CII).

The purpose of CII is to empower technology companies to help out mission-critical open-source projects that need funding.

The project will receive funds for developers so they can continue work regarding open-source management.
OpenSSL will be the first project under consideration.  In 2013, OpenSSL, which is at the heart of Web security only had $9,000 in funding.

In the past years, OpenSSL received an average of $2,000 per year in donations.  That is definitely not enough to provide adequate research for security.

The multimillion dollar project will be administered by The Linux Foundation and a full-force group made of project backers along with open-source developers and industry stakeholders.

This project will help fund fellowships for key developers to work full-time on open source projects, security audits, computing and test infrastructure, travel, face-to-face meeting coordination along with other needed support.

Open-source development has always produced high quality and secure software.  Although, the Heartbleed Bug resulted in evidence that open source doesn’t guarantee that it won’t have flaws.

This project is to make sure that open-source development doesn’t have to operate on a shoe-string like system.

Colin Kincaid, Cisco’s VP of Product Management and Architecture, said, “Supporting dedicated open source collaborators and contributors is vital to the success and growth of innovation.”

Securing open source software is a critical issue.  It took a major security catastrophe, but now technology’s major company’s have realized that open-source software is a necessary part of global technology.

This is a base that must be supported and help funded.  The result will be a better quality and safer software for everyone.

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References:
Cisco, Microsoft, VMware, and other tech giants unite behind critical open-source projects – ZDNet
http://www.zdnet.com/cisco-microsoft-vmware-and-other-tech-giants-unite-behind-critical-open-source-projects-7000028743/?s_cid=e539&ttag=e539&ftag=TRE17cfd61