McAfee, Riverbed Partner To Provide Integrated Security, WAN Optimisation

McAfee and Riverbed Technology have announced their partnership to now deliver Web 2.0 security capabilities on the Riverbed Services Platform (RSP). This partnership underscores the two companies’ commitment to delivering best; comprehensive security coupled with wide area network (WAN) optimisation solutions for distributed enterprises. The McAfee Web Gateway solution delivers comprehensive security for all Web 2.0 traffic, and coupled with the award-winning Riverbed Steelhead appliance, enables a superior level of proactive Web 2.0 protection from headquarters to branch offices.

The RSP is a virtualised, extensible data services platform integrated with the Steelhead appliance hardware that allows customers to deploy multiple best-of-breed edge services that formerly required dedicated servers. Customers can deploy virtualised applications, such as McAfee Web Gateway Security, directly on the RSP to further minimise the hardware infrastructure footprint at the branch office, thereby reducing operational overhead.

The new joint solution complements the existing McAfee Firewall Enterprise software, which is currently available on the RSP. By leveraging the best solutions from McAfee and Riverbed in a single appliance, enterprises are able to deliver accelerated data and application access to users while protecting critical information and infrastructure from security threats.

The consumerisation of IT has leveraged the popularity of Web 2.0 applications in the enterprise, and social networking applications have increasingly become a primary component of mainstream marketing and sales initiatives. Social media applications, such as Facebook and Twitter, provide a great service to marketing efforts, but are also a new source of targeted attacks by cybercriminals looking to infiltrate corporate systems.

Preventing intellectual property leaks via social media is also a major concern among organisations, especially with the lack of visibility and control over multiple remote offices. The joining of forces between the leading WAN optimisation provider and the world’s largest dedicated security company addresses the need for advanced Web 2.0 security, by providing customers with intent analysis, URL filtering, McAfee anti-virus, anti-malware protection and WAN optimisation to protect Web 2.0 experiences throughout the organisation, regardless of location.

“Organisations realise that Web 2.0 is important, but often security measures do not match the growth rate at which employees are using these applications,” said David Scholtz, Senior Vice President of Worldwide Strategic Alliances, McAfee. “To prevent malicious Web attacks and data leakage, organisations need a new level of control and by adding McAfee Web Gateway to the Riverbed and McAfee Enterprise Firewall solution, customers now have the most comprehensive security solution in a WAN optimisation platform available?”

“Riverbed enables its customers to consolidate edge services at the branch office, helping organisations to reduce the IT footprint in the branch, simplify IT management and reduce costs while still delivering LAN-like application performance to distributed employees,” said Venugopal Pai, Vice President of Global Alliances, Riverbed. “By running McAfee Web Gateway security on the RSP, enterprises experience these benefits along with the ability to proactively protect themselves against the threats that attack systems via social media and other Web 2.0 applications.”