Microsoft’s Solution Accelerator – Security and Compliance team is pleased to announce the release of the Windows Vista Security Guide, which is now available for downloading.

The Windows Vista Security Guide provides IT Professionals like you with specific recommendations and automated tools to further harden Windows Vista against real-world security threats.

Based on your feedback and extensive experience from other customers, government agencies, and Microsoft security experts, the Windows Vista Security Guide is designed to provide comprehensive vulnerability, risk, and mitigation analyses to help you understand the tradeoffs between security and functionality.

Using the Windows Vista Security Guide, you can choose from one of two baseline security configurations to meet the requirements of your environment, and then modify and test a wide variety of security settings, as well as other new and enhanced security technologies in Windows Vista:

• The Enterprise Client (EC) environment is designed to meet the needs of most corporations.

• Only in environments in which security outweighs functionality considerations—such as those in major financial institutions and government intelligence agencies—does the guide recommend using the Specialized Security – Limited Functionality (SSLF) security configuration. You can further tailor these security configurations to defend against threats such as malware and information theft.

The security recommendations in the Windows Vista Security Guide have been validated through extensive testing. And the GPO Accelerator tool that accompanies the guidance helps you automatically deploy the security settings in minutes instead of hours.

A hardcopy version of the Windows Vista Security Guide will also be released in coming weeks; the hardcopy version will include a CD with sample code and detailed information about security in Windows Vista.  – Please stay tuned for more information.

A special thanks to all of you who provided such valuable feedback on the beta version of the guide! The time you took to share your thoughts with us had a real impact on this important guide.

To learn more about the Windows Vista Security Guide, click here.

And be sure to visit our Solution Accelerator team’s page to see our other security guides (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/guidance/default.mspx).

Kelly Hengesteg
Senior Program Manager
Microsoft Security & Compliance Solutions