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McAfee, Inc. to Acquire MX Logic and Provide Industry’s Most Comprehensive Security-as-a-Service Portfolio
Posted in: C-Level, Communicate, Industry News, Messaging, Security by thirdoctet on July 30, 2009 | No Comments
Company to Add More than 40,000 Customers, Four Million End Users and 1,800 Partners
Care of McAfee.com; SANTA CLARA, Calif., July 30, 2009 – McAfee, Inc. (NYSE:MFE) today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire privately owned MX Logic, Inc. for approximately $140 million in cash at closing, with an earn-out of up to an additional $30 million in cash if certain performance targets are met. MX Logic is a leading global provider of cloud-based email and Web security and email archiving and continuity services. Adding MX Logic’s technologies and services will provide McAfee with the most comprehensive cloud-based security portfolio in the industry, one that combines leading global threat intelligence technologies from McAfee with its Security-as-a-Service solutions:Global Threat Intelligence
- McAfee® Artemis protects more than 33 million nodes through real-time cloud-based intelligence
- McAfee TrustedSource™ analyzes data from more than 100 billion messages per month
- McAfee SiteAdvisor® provides consumers with a safer search, surf, and online shopping experience by serving 1.9 billion ratings every day
Security-as-a-Service
- McAfee Total Protection Service, endpoint protection via Security-as-a-Service, protects more than five million users with centralized management in the cloud
- McAfee Vulnerability Assessment, Web application and network vulnerability assessments via Security-as-a-Service, provides real-time validation against industry standards including Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard
- McAfee SECURE helps keep consumers safe from cybercrime by scanning more than 80,000 merchant Web sites daily and serving more than 126 billion impressions since 2008. Additionally, McAfee vulnerability scanning services protects more than 250,000 Web sites.
- MX Logic protects 40,000 customers with more than four million end users with email and Web security and email archiving and continuity services
- More than 1800 MX Logic channel partners provide a strong Security SaaS partner ecosystem to cross sell McAfee Security SaaS solutions and develop co-branded and bundled offerings
- MX Logic data centers in Asia Pacific, EMEA, Japan and the United States protect a geographically dispersed customer base with the capacity to expand into new customer segments and global markets
“The acquisition of MX Logic will reinforce our position as a leader in Security-as-a-Service, and brings world-class email and Web defense, including archiving and business continuity services, extending our proven expertise in providing cloud-based services to our customers,” said Dave DeWalt, president and chief executive officer, McAfee. “MX Logic aligns with the McAfee vision to lead Security SaaS by bringing industry-leading technologies and a strong partner ecosystem.”
Following completion of the proposed acquisition, McAfee will offer the most comprehensive and dedicated security portfolio in the market with the broadest set of delivery options including appliances, software, in the cloud or hybrid deployments. This approach will give businesses in all market segments the flexibility to purchase these solutions as standalone offerings or to mix and match these deployment choices to meet their exact needs.
“We view McAfee as the leading dedicated security company and a pioneer in Security-as-a-Service,” said John Street, chairman and chief executive officer, MX Logic. “We will now be even better equipped to help our customers address the complex challenges associated with blocking spam, phishing scams, viruses in the cloud, and enforcing email policies to prevent sensitive data leaks.”
Following the closing of the proposed acquisition, the MX Logic team will report to the McAfee Software-as-a-Service business unit, headed by Marc Olesen, senior vice president and general manager.
The acquisition is expected to close in the third quarter of 2009, contingent upon regulatory approval and other customary closing conditions. McAfee expects the impact of the acquisition of MX Logic to be breakeven to slightly accretive in 2010 on non-GAAP earnings-per-share and more dilutive to GAAP earnings-per-share. For the remainder of 2009 we expect the impact of the acquisition to be $0.01 to $0.02 dilutive to non-GAAP earnings-per-share and more dilutive to GAAP earnings-per-share. Non-GAAP earnings-per-share will exclude the impact of amortization of acquired intangibles, stock-based compensation expense and other nonrecurring costs or charges. For additional information, please reference the acquisition landing page at http://www.mcafee.com/us/about/corporate/mcafee_mxlogic.html and the McAfee Security Insights Blog at http://siblog.McAfee.com/.
About McAfee, Inc.
McAfee, Inc., headquartered in Santa Clara, California, is the world’s largest dedicated security technology company. McAfee is committed to relentlessly tackling the world’s toughest security challenges. The company delivers proactive and proven solutions and services that help secure systems and networks around the world, allowing users to safely connect to the Internet, browse and shop the web more securely. Backed by an award-winning research team, McAfee creates innovative products that empower home users, businesses, the public sector and service providers by enabling them to prove compliance with regulations, protect data, prevent disruptions, identify vulnerabilities, and continuously monitor and improve their security. http://www.mcafee.com.
About MX Logic, Inc.
MX Logic is a leading global provider of managed email and Web security, archiving, and business continuity services that deliver enterprise-grade performance without enterprise-level complexity and cost. Its easy-to-use, award-winning services reduce risk and liability, lower overall IT costs, and increase productivity. MX Logic services are available through its industry-leading partner network. For more information, visit www.MXLogic.com.
Forward-Looking Statements:
This release contains forward-looking statements, which include those regarding future plans that McAfee has for the MX Logic business, expectations of McAfee regarding the combination of MX Logic’s products and services with McAfee products and services, the expected closing date of the acquisition, the expectations as to the opportunities resulting from the acquisition of the MX Logic business, expected plans that McAfee has for the integration of MX Logic’s products and business and the expected impact of the acquisition on McAfee financial results for 2009 and 2010. Factors that could cause the actual results or outcomes from the acquisition to be materially different from those anticipated include, among others, the inability to complete the acquisition on acceptable terms, or at all; the inability to integrate successfully MX Logic within McAfee or to realize synergies from such integration; costs related to the acquisition of MX Logic; the customer response to, and acceptance of, the combination of MX Logic’s products with McAfee products; the economic environment of the industries in which McAfee and MX Logic operate. In addition, actual results are subject to other risks and uncertainties that relate more broadly to overall McAfee business, including those more fully described in McAfee filings with the SEC, including its annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2008, and its subsequent quarterly reports on Form 10-Q. The forward-looking statements in this press release are based on information available to McAfee as of the date hereof, and McAfee expressly disclaims any obligation to update any forward-looking statements.
NOTE: McAfee and any additional McAfee marks herein are registered trademarks of McAfee, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and/or other countries. McAfee Red in connection with security is distinctive of McAfee brand products. All other registered and unregistered trademarks herein are the sole property of their respective owners. Product specifications subject to change at any time without prior notice. © 2009 McAfee, Inc. All rights reserved.
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RSA to kick off next week with Microsoft’s ‘Stirling’
Posted in: Industry News, Security by thirdoctet on April 4, 2008 | No Comments
The world’s largest security conference will kick off next week in San Francisco with the public unveiling of Microsoft’s next-generation of security software, code-named Stirling.
Over the past few months, Microsoft has quietly shown the software to a select group of users, but sources familiar with the company’s plans said that it will release a beta version of the code to users during the RSA Conference next Tuesday. Microsoft will allow attendees to “see new technologies,” including Stirling and the company’s next-generation Windows Server 2008 software, according to the conference agenda.
Microsoft’s Forefront product line has been playing with more established security products over the past few years, but with Stirling the company will finally be able to offer administrators a single product that manages all of its security offerings.
“Stirling will touch many different areas of network protection, server protection and client protection,” said Ronald Beekelaar, an independent IT consultant based in Amsterdam, who is familiar with the Forefront products. “So Microsoft has to coordinate that between different products. But that also means that beta testers should really look at Stirling at all those levels, and not just test the client protection, or only the firewall protection,” he wrote in an e-mail interview.
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Gartner Places Citrix in the Leaders Quadrant for 2007
Posted in: Application Delivery, Industry News, Security by thirdoctet on September 25, 2007 | No Comments
Citrix Systems, Inc. (Nasdaq:CTXS), the global leader in application delivery infrastructure, today announced that Citrix Password Manager™, a key component of its Citrix Presentation Server™ product line for Windows application delivery, has been positioned by Gartner, Inc. in the leaders quadrant of the “Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Single Sign-On, 2007”i report authored by Gartner Research Director Gregg Kreizman.
With more than 200,000 customers, Citrix Presentation Server is the industry’s leading solution for delivering Windows-based applications with the best security, performance and cost savings. The Password Manager integrated enterprise single sign-on (ESSO) capabilities make it easy for these users to securely access all their applications with a single password, then reset that password via the web without calling the help desk. In addition to its ESSO capabilities, Presentation Server also integrates secure application access capabilities based on its award-winning Citrix Access Gateway™ solution, which also placed in the leaders quadrant of Gartner’s “Magic Quadrant for SSL VPN, North America, 3Q06”ii report earlier this year.
Password Manager and Access Gateway are available both as standalone solutions or as part of the Citrix Presentation Server, Platinum Edition. More information on Citrix Presentation Server can also be found in a recent report by Gartner Principal Research Analyst Federica Troniiii ( http://www.gartner.com/DisplayDocument?ref=g_search&id=509490&subref=simplesearch ).
“IT administrators need top notch security for their applications, as well as a solution that won’t compromise ease of use and productivity for their users,” said David Roussain, vice president of product marketing, Virtualization Systems Group, Citrix Systems. “By featuring seamless, integrated password management as a critical element of the application delivery infrastructure, Citrix Password Manager ensures that employee productivity and system usability are preserved. We are honored that Citrix Password Manager has been placed in the ESSO leaders quadrant.”
To be placed in the leaders quadrant, Gartner looks for influential companies in the Enterprise Single Sign-On (ESSO) market that “show a consistent ability to gain new customers in broad industries and geographies, and at the higher end of the quadrant, have very good to excellent customer references, products that easily or very easily integrate with target systems, and a commitment to rapidly provide the product updates their customers want.”
Your Boss Is Spying on You: Inside New Office Surveillance Software
Posted in: Security by thirdoctet on September 20, 2007 | No Comments
More stealthy and prevalent than ever before, corporate security software is monitoring your every move inside and out of the workplace, whether it’s with your corporate computer, e-mail, phone or BlackBerry. Your employer has more powerful tools to watch over you than the cops—and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Jeffrey W. Keener is a corporate keymaster—one of a rapidly growing number of security professionals who can unlock all your office secrets. Whether you’re on a PC in the next room or a Mac in Madagascar, Keener is just a few keystrokes away from watching the contents of strangers’ hard drives whiz by. It may seem Orwellian, but this constant monitoring is a crucial cog in the well-oiled machine of business investigation—and one more inevitable tick on the countdown to a surveillance society. I saw it in action last week at the fourth-floor New York satellite office of California-based Guidance Software (which boasts Halliburton, Lowe’s and many Fortune 500 companies among its clients), as Keener called up one of his surveillance programs.
“Is this real-time?” I asked.
“Oh yeah,” he assured me. “This is what’s on the server right now.”
I squinted at the screen, because at first glance it didn’t look like much: a series of windows displaying a directory of system files and open applications, broken down into file trees as you might see when exploring your home computer. But beneath this commonplace graphical interface is a new high-tech tug of war between employees and their employers over personal information in the workplace.
Americans are trapped in a technological and demographic change that has increasingly pulled our personal communications into our offices. According to a 2006 survey from the U.S. Census Bureau, 54.6 percent of all married couples now have both husband and wife in the workforce, so those calls to the school principal, transactions with online banking and lovers’ spats will inevitably take place using company computers and telephones—especially with the corporate e-mail market expected to expand more than tenfold to 130 million accounts worldwide by the end of 2010. And while a large majority of Americans actually favor more forms of surveillance for law enforcement, many of the personal expectations they still hold dear don’t apply when punching in 9-to-5. “I always tell people, ‘There is no true privacy in this country any more,’” says lawyer Sharon D. Nelson, president of Sensei Enterprises, a consulting firm specializing in legal technology and computer forensics. “And that’s more true at the workplace than anywhere else.”
You may think the data is yours, but the equipment is theirs, and employers reserve the right to micromanage all the bits and packets on their networks, computers and mobile devices. There’s no such thing as unreasonable search and seizure when it comes to company property, and the surveillance tools used by IT departments are getting stealthier and more powerful—and more heavily funded each year. How do you know if you’re under suspicion? You don’t. If it were your computer Keener was exploring, you’d probably never know.
“Our software agent runs in the background and rarely uses more than 20 percent of the computer’s processing power,” he says. “If you had an iPod or digital camera charging through the USB port, we could browse all the files that were stored onto the device.”
IronPort beefs up email security appliance
Posted in: Industry News, Messaging, Security by thirdoctet on September 13, 2007 | No Comments
IronPort Systems, a Cisco business unit, has unveiled new data-loss prevention and encryption capabilities for its email security appliances. These new features, which are being integrated into IronPort’s AsyncOS operating system for its email security appliances, are designed to help enterprises more easily protect their sensitive information, according to company officials.
Unlike dedicated data-loss prevention products that require separate software and/or hardware, AsyncOS’ new features add leak protection to the existing security features of IronPort’s email appliances, which provide spam and virus filtering as well as policy creation, content scanning, quarantining and archiving.
The new data-loss prevention features include content-scanning capabilities with keyword and smart-identifier matching, as well as regulatory and customised dictionaries. Content that is scanned includes email message bodies plus hundreds of attachment types, including Microsoft Office documents, they say. Options for outbound messages that contain sensitive information include quarantine, encryption, archive and notify, and can be managed by IronPort’s Email Security Manager tool.
With this enhancement to AsyncOS, IronPort has added its PXE encryption technology directly on to its applications, so that inbound and outbound email can be encrypted and decrypted without the need of additional hardware, officials say.
EMC develops security for VMware software
Posted in: Security, Virtualization by thirdoctet on | No Comments
EMC is working on security products that would work with VMware software, EMC Executive Vice President Arthur Coviello said Thursday. Coviello, who is president of EMC’s RSA security business, said during a Citi technology conference that his company is working on such products with VMware, an affiliate of EMC that went public last month.
Coviello said it is too early to make any product announcements, but he added, “We think there is a tremendous opportunity, going forward.” Coviello said RSA is “working with VMware to create virtual security layers for whatever images you are trying to access in a virtual environment.”
The DST patch returns
Posted in: Hands on, Security by thirdoctet on September 7, 2007 | No Comments
Leaves are turning and nights are cool. To IT managers in Windows shops, this can mean only one thing – time to make sure that all machines purchased this summer have all their proper daylight-saving time updates.
Microsoft released two DST updates through Windows Software Update Service this week, which were all minor tweaks for time changes in countries like Armenia and Jordan. This update includes the spring’s DST updates as well, according to Microsoft.
But Windows shops that bought new machines this summer should take time out to determine if they have DST updates on all of them.
“The people who may be caught unaware are going to be those [IT managers] who bought new servers and desktops that may not have that update,” said Eric Schultze, chief security architect at Shavlik Technologies, a software security company in Roseville, Minn.
Federal legislation added about three weeks to the DST period as an energy conservation effort. This fall, standard time will start on Nov. 4, which is one week later than in the past.
Although all machines should still be double-checked, experts don’t expect the same confusion that came with the spring updates. Earlier this year as it got closer to March 11 – the newly designated DST start date, which was about two weeks earlier than the usual one – IT managers began to get anxious with such little time left.
IT managers were also irritated by what they said they believed was an overly complicated and chaotic update process. Microsoft issued no other patches one month so IT managers could catch up on DST updates.
M3 Sweatt, Microsoft’s chief of staff in the Windows Core Operating System Development, said he thinks most enterprise IT administrators know what changes, if any, they need to make to keep their systems completely updates.
If there is any doubt, IT managers can get online support and more details about how to run a test on existing systems to check for updated.
Microsoft also has a DST area on its Web site called A test version of the 2007 global time zone update for Windows that provides a DST assessment checklist, an enterprise response plan and a patching overview for DST updates.
“The same risks are involved this time,” Schultze said. “There will be a mini-flurry of activity, and IT managers should check their systems for new machines or machines that somehow didn’t get patched the first time around.”
Fight viruses with your USB flash drive
Posted in: Deskside, Hands on, Security by thirdoctet on | No Comments
I’ve heard that lawyers and doctors were once skittish about telling people their professions at a cocktail party. When other partygoers would hear, they’d seek medical or legal advice, creating a Vortex of Free Consulting (VoFC). At today’s parties, if you mention that you work in the computer security field, a similar VoFC will very likely materialize around you. In the presence of a security guru like you, who can blame your hosts for seeking some help with slow-working PCs or incessant pop-ups?
There are often times when information security professionals need to perform some quick remediation but don’t have the luxury of their full toolsets. To that end, in this month’s tip we’ll discuss how to build a portable software kit for use on malware-infected machines. A huge number of very useful system analysis and malware-fighting tools are available for free on the Internet. I urge you to download them and burn them to a CD or, better yet, write them to a cheap 1 GB USB memory token. Then, carry that USB token with you wherever you go (even to fancy cocktail parties), so you are ready to swoop in like an information security superhero to save people in distress.
CIS Virtual Machine Security Guidelines
Posted in: Security, Virtualization by thirdoctet on | No Comments
The Center for Internet Security (CIS) and systems management technology innovator Configuresoft announced availability of the first Virtual Machine Security Guidelines. In addition, CIS and Configuresoft will unveil a draft of the upcoming VMware ESX Server Benchmark at the 2007 VMworld conference in order to solicit input from attendees. VMworld 2007 will be held at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, Calif. from September 11 – 13, 2007.In February, 2007, CIS and Configuresoft developed a benchmark working group and, with input from more than 200 virtualization and security experts from the commercial market and federal organizations, created the industry’s first virtual machine security benchmark. CIS benchmarks and guidelines are unique in the industry in that they are created via broad consensus. This benchmark extends and enhances the hardening guidelines offered by the manufacturers by consolidating the expert opinion of the world’s leading security experts.
Now, CIS is offering interested parties the opportunity to join the consensus process for its forthcoming benchmark which will provide further guidance for organizations as they secure their virtual systems deployed on VMware’s ESX servers. VMworld attendees can sign up to participate at Configuresoft’s booth #1120 and immediately share ideas and feedback.
As adoption of virtualization increases, analysts foresee security issues on the horizon. According to recent Gartner research 1 “Many organizations mistakenly assume that their approach for securing VMs (Virtual Machines) will be the same as securing any operating system (OS) and thus plan to apply their existing configuration guidelines and standards.” The report also states, “Through 2009, 60% of production VMs will be less secure than their physical counterparts.”
“While there are many benefits for data center virtualization, careful attention must be paid to the potential of new security threats born out of the additional complexity produced by virtualization,” said Bert Miuccio, Vice President, The Center for Internet Security. “With input from so many leaders and experts – as well as the broad consensus we will build as a result of VMworld – we are confident that the final versions of both important benchmarks will provide a solid roadmap for organizations as they secure their virtual environments.”
In addition to the general benchmark and the VMware ESX-specific benchmark, CIS plans to create benchmarks for additional virtualization platforms including Microsoft’s Virtual Server and Xen Virtual Machine. Each guide will provide detailed instructions and recommendations that include the precise settings for each system and particular advice on tuning systems to meet the guidelines developed by the consortium. CIS guidance is also available at www.cisecurity.org.
“It’s only a matter of time before organizations that do not correctly configure the increased number of settings in their virtual environments become the victims of security breaches or other security incidents,” said Chris Farrow, director, Center for Policy & Compliance for Configuresoft and co-chair of the benchmark. “It was evident to us through customer feedback and industry commentary, that a benchmark specific to virtualization security was needed. Through collaboration with CIS and the broad team of contributors, organizations will now have a rapid path for securely adopting virtualization.”
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Network access control vendors: Attraction vs. retention
Posted in: Security by thirdoctet on August 31, 2007 | No Comments
Network access control (NAC) vendors’ marketing campaigns may make their products more attractive to companies, but smaller vendors still dominate when it comes to customer retention, according to recent statistics released by Current Analysis.
Andrew Braunberg, Current Analysis’ research director, said his firm’s annual NAC study found that a strong marketing budget and message put certain vendors at top of mind among companies considering and planning NAC deployments.
Not surprisingly, Cisco’s Network Admission Control appliance and framework hold the top two spots respectively as the most attractive network access control solutions to potential customers who have not yet deployed NAC.
According to Current Analysis’ study, 45% of respondents said they would consider putting Cisco’s NAC appliance in their networks, while 41% said Cisco’s NAC framework is also an attractive option. Cisco was closely followed by Microsoft’s Network Access Protection, which 21% of respondents said they’d consider for their network access control deployment.
Check Point, Juniper Networks, Sygate/Symantec, 3Com/Tipping Point, Trend Micro, McAfee/Foundstone, HP ProCurve, IBM Tivoli, Nortel, CA and Bradford Networks rounded out the list of vendors that potential NAC users would consider or found attractive, ranging from 5% to 15% of respondents.