How Good Is Your Web Site's Online Reputation?How Good Is Your Web Site's Online Reputation?

Curious about what kind of reputation your company's Web site has in the online community? Starting today, it will be easier to find out.

Secure Computing, a gateway security company, on Tuesday launched its Domain Health Check, a free Web service that gives users a behavior-based view of the messaging and Web reputation of their domains. Users who sign up are e-mailed a report about the security of their domain as seen and correlated from thousands of points around the globe, according to a company release.

"It's a way for companies to find out if they have a problem they didn't know about," said a spokesman for the company. "It's another form of a heads up."

IT managers are dealing with users who might have gotten their PCs infected with viruses and Trojans that open them up to remote control. Hackers might be using these zombie machines to launch denial-of-service attacks or to send out millions of pieces of spam. All of that is going to hurt your company site's reputation.

In recent months, IT managers also have had to deal with hackers breaking into their Web sites to embed malicious code that infects unsuspecting users. It's one thing for a user to have to be wary of unfamiliar Web sites, but now they also are being forced to be more cautious about the legitimate sites they might visit on a regular basis.

Sophos, a security company, reported in April that the majority of new threats that have come out this year are embedded in malicious Web sites. In the first quarter of this year, Sophos identified an average of 5,000 new infected Web pages every day. With computer users becoming more aware of how to protect against e-mail-based malware, hackers have turned to the Web as their preferred vector of attack.

Secure Computing's new tool is designed to help IT managers figure out if their site is a good or bad Internet citizen.

Users who request a Domain Health Check will receive a report that provides a snapshot of their domain's security reputation regarding Web and e-mail traffic. Reputation scores are calculated based on behavior data captured in real-time by Secure Computing's TrustedSource reputation service, according to the company. Like a credit score, a reputation score indicates whether a site is in good standing, or if it may have been compromised and is being used in nefarious ways. As part of the report, participants will receive remediation tips that serve as a starting point to rectify any problems.