You are extremely busy typing away an important e-mail at a brisk speed to your client, when all of a sudden a pop-up from the right corner of your window announces—"Your system has been infected."
More often than not, one tends to ignore such warnings and continues to do his/her work and then one fine day- the SYSTEM CRASHES!
What do you do? How do you address a situation where you receive hundreds of spam and viruses into your emails and hang or slow down your systems? The answer lies in the ability to fight security breaches, which is easier said than done. Not long ago, companies analyzed this situation and fought myriad security troubles by using a blend of tools at their disposal, which proved to be costly and time-consuming exercise. Thus the eon of unfailing and super performance security solutions was born which is now popularly being talked about as Unified Threat Management (UTM).
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With UTM products becoming a preferred choice for most today, it is not as easy for anyone to go out and choose an UTM product for their companies, as the UTM products differ from vendor to vendor. For the uninitiated, an ideal UTM product would basically comprise of Intrusion detection systems (IDS)/ Intrusion prevention systems (IPS), anti-spyware and Gateway antivirus, anti-spam, firewall/VPN (Virtual Private Networks) in addition to web filtering and anti-phishing.
Manoj Chugh, president (India & SAARC region), EMC Data Storage Systems, also admits that threat can come from any quarters and one needs to get a backup of their data. "Today, network storage is being recognized as an industry and one needs to support it in a major way and also ensure that the enormous information is streamlined. The focus is today on the 'I' of the IT that is information," he feels.
Having the right UTM product means enjoying a comprehensive range of functionalities, including reactive mechanisms complemented by proactive ones and network-layer mechanisms by visibility and control at the network layer.
Ajit Pillai, country manager, WatchGuard, an eminent player in the UTM space, while talking about the market scenario in
"WatchGuard provides security solutions under their Firebox® X e-Series. Other companies such as Symantec, Elite Core, Fortinet, Sonic Wall and many more are operating in this space with their unique blend of offerings to suit the customer's security needs," says Pillai.
A true UTM device should meet the above requirements, as well as have the following specific features: VPN, multi-layered firewall, multi-method intrusion detection and prevention, multi-protocol antivirus, anti-spyware, anti-phishing, anti-spam, and Web filtering.
Nagendra Venkaswamy adds that every vendor would agree to the fact that the products work only when they have the ability to virtualize.
"This means that when you incorporate virtualization in any UTM offering, it helps the client to dispense diverse 'virtual' UTM devices into myriad user groups or network segments, which enables the system to be managed using a single interface.
Technologies that utilize the virtualization domain could include-- Virtual Routers, Security Zones, Virtual Systems, Virtual LANs (Local Area Networks) and many more," he says.
The UTM products will produce enormous effects on the company's potential in the fast growing markets today. For this the companies will have to employ a team that is fully working 24/7 on threat management in order to guard the enterprise against the e-enemies.
So that the next time you are busy typing an email to your client, you are not DISTURBED!
