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Gateway security vendor Secure Computing has announced that they are going to add virtual support to most of their security offerings. In a team-up effort with VMWare, Secure Computing is turning some of their better known security appliances into virtual appliances to use in VM driven environments.
Secure Computing goes virtual with VMWare team-up. (IMG: J.Anderson)
Virtualization is still a growing trend for IT. The reasons vary from company to company, but largely VM technology is used as a means to lower costs and equipment overhead, or as a way to go “green” and lower energy consumption in a datacenter. There has been some growth in the VM market with new security appliances being offered that protect VM systems and offer security to applications running on a VM server.
There are also cases where after a conversion to VM is complete, companies are left with racks full of hardware simply because they are all security related. There is also the problem some companies face that requires security on two fronts. Security designed for VM and hardware security for the parts of the network that were not virtualized. That seems ridiculous in writing, but in some companies, it’s the truth.
With that said, and without sounding like a sales person, there is nothing new about this Secure Computing announcement, but the ability to take Secure Firewall for example, and add the Firewall CommandCenter to it, you could run thirty or so firewalls and manage them from one location. This is certainly unexpected and at the same time tempting.
It should be mentioned that most of Secure Computing’s offerings are hardware based with some software add-on options. Seeing this announcement came as a surprise, as when Tech Herald spoke with Secure Computing at RSA, VM technology was mentioned only in passing.
The combined efforts from VMWare and Secure Computing will offer Secure Firewall, Secure Web, and Secure Mail to companies of various sizes and give them the same protections that they would see from the hardware based offerings. They expect to have evaluation versions launched by June, with commercial versions in the third quarter this year.
Disclosure: Tech Herald is currently testing one of Secure Computing’s appliances, SnapGear. The test is not complete, but Tech Herald is currently using Secure Firewall, Secure Web and the internal UTM features offered on the SnapGear 565. There will be a full review in the coming few weeks. No bias is intended in the mentioning of the VM offerings. As with any product, you should research it fully on your own before making any decisions.
To see the information on what Tech Herald is testing look here:http://www.securecomputing.com/index.cfm?skey=1693
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