Microsoft Trustworthy Developer Content Strategy

Technorati Tags: developer content strategy,privacy,security

I was at my Vice President's (Scott Charney) all hands meeting last month. Scott was talking about the need to discuss online safety and Green IT to IT Pros and developers. I was taking some notes and Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs pyramid came to mind.

I thought of what Scott was saying and realized that there was a order to what we need to communicate and drive awareness for. Before we can talk about data privacy to developers and IT Professionals, it was necessary to ensure that the customers platform and applications were secure. Only then can you even think of approaching data privacy.

If an ISV or a corporate development team is to consider data privacy as a requirement, then Security is mandatory. If you're a ISV or a independent software vendor, then you're going to have to answer the questions to your customers who are going to ask you the obvious question, "Am I safe online?".

Online Safety is comprised of Privacy and Security. Let's say you want to provide online safety to your customers who buy your software. You'll probably want to ensure that there is legislation/compliance in place to drive the online safety to protect the customer as well as independent software vendors to limit your liability when you've taken the time and due diligence to ensure your application development efforts coincide with the Microsoft Development Lifecycle.

The way we drive awareness and provide privacy and security for customers is by ensuring that independent software vendors are utilizing the Microsoft SDL in their software development efforts along with organization that expose customer data through online banking portals, or online account access.