Patent ID: 7584508

Claim:
An information device having a dynamically configurable security arrangement, the device comprising: computer circuitry, including a processor operatively coupled to a data store; a user interface, including display and user input devices; communications circuitry; and a power supply that provides power to the computer circuitry, user interface, and communications circuitry; wherein the computer circuitry includes a security arrangement comprising: a configurable security module that provides security-related functionality in the information device according to a configuration of operational settings; a risk profiling module that re-assesses a current set of security risks to which the information device is exposed; a computing capacity determining module that re-assesses computing capacity availability relating to usage and performance expectations for operation of the information device; and a security configuration module that automatically and dynamically configures the operational settings of the security module based on the current set of security risks from the risk profiling module and on the current state of dynamically-variable computing capacity availability from the computing capacity determining module, wherein the security configuration module includes: a configuration determining module that determines, from among a set of security-related functionality with which the security module is to be configured in response to the current set of security risks from the risk profiling module, a subset of more essential security functionality and a subset of less essential security functionality relevant to the current set of security risks; and a configuration setting module that sets the configuration of operational settings such that, in response to the computing capacity availability being indicative of a reduction of computing capacity availability from a previous computing capacity availability, the configuration setting module disables the subset of less essential security functionality to an extent that computational loading on the computer circuitry attributable to operation of the configurable security module is reduced to facilitate operation of the information device corresponding to the usage and performance expectations while executing the subset of more essential security functionality in the configurable security module.