I was over at the Terminal 23 blog ("ghosts in the wire"). It's an interesting tech blog and I'm surprised I'd never stumbled upon it before. The writer (Michael, that's all I know) had a great blog post titled "Has security gently guided technology development?"
The implied answer is "Yes," and he seems to speculate that if this guidance runs its full course, we might have "a return to dummy terminals, only this time enabled on the Internet through the browser"
I'm not sure it's all because of security (I think convenience, cost, and ease of management are the other factors driving this guidance), but it's interesting to speculate upon. We've already seen this starting in the physical security world, where some access control systems no longer need a central software system running on a PC, but rather pull all their information from a web-enabled panel at the door. Dummy terminals for end users indeed.
I think Terminal 23 implies a critique of this model, but if you step away from the gripe that we might be creating a bland world for computing, I think he has a fairly persuasive "10,000-foot view" on this technology change. Read Terminal 23's full post on technology guidance by security.
--Geoff
