Symantec to offer DLP solution for iPads
October 4, 2011
By Liam Lahey
Security vendor’s Data Loss Prevention for Tablet solution will monitor, protect the transmission of corporate data
Symantec says it’ll offer the world’s first comprehensive Data Loss Prevention (DLP) solution for tablets in early 2012.
The Symantec Data Loss Prevention for Tablet solution will only be available for Apple iPads initially. It’s designed to monitor and protect the transmission of sensitive corporate data whether the user is connected to a public Wi-Fi or a 3G network. Support for Android-based tablets will be introduced at some point thereafter.
“Symantec has been selling data loss prevention solutions for a number of years now. This is the technology that helps companies prevent inadvertent or even malicious data leaks or breaches,” explained Tim Matthews, senior director of product marketing at Symantec. “The issue now is people are really in love with their iPads; they’re wanting to bring them into work to connect to the corporate network or they’re using them on the road and this simply brings more risk for the company.”
Thus the product enables organizations to support work and personal use concurrently across corporate and personal email, Web communications, and common applications available for the iPad. Current Symantec DLP customers can leverage their existing investment by utilizing the same policies and management infrastructure.
DLP is at the top of the list for security teams, he added; it’s a hot topic for the IT channel.
“The nice thing about it is it provides an immediate view of risk to companies so there’s a quick payback for the investment,” he remarked. “The partner becomes strategic (for the customer) because you’re helping them uncover their greatest areas of risk . . . and there’s ongoing tuning of detection technology in their workflows.”
But Symantec DLP for Tablet doesn’t cover smartphones.
“The reason why tablets are a primary concern is they’re typically used to view sensitive documents and to edit these documents so it was thought to be a higher risk area than mobile phones,” he said. “We’ll keep an eye on the smartphone space but we’re beginning with tablets because they seem to be the bigger risk according to the customers we’ve talked to.”
To that end, the security vendor did its homework before making the announcement. Symantec’s latest “State of Security Survey” found organizations worldwide are grappling with the new security challenges posed by iPads and tablets. Of the survey’s respondents, 47 per cent said mobile computing was making it more difficult to provide online security, and 45 per cent said the “consumerization of IT” was a concern.
There are similarities between Symantec’s DLP for Tablet solution and the concept of mobile device management (MDM), Matthews acknowledged, but what Symantec’s product does that MDM doesn’t is monitor the content mailed, sent, or stored in the cloud from the iPad.
“If that content is sensitive, this product will detect that that information is being sent, and it will either notify the user, block it, or potentially encrypt it. We call it ‘content awareness’ to differentiate between the two,” he said. “Even if you provision and manage your phones and you can zap it if it’s lost, that still leaves you wide open to someone storing a document in the cloud with sensitive customer data or Gmailing [sic] something off of their iPad to somewhere that’s not controlled by the company.
“They’re both related (MDM and DLP) and have to do with putting more work on the IT and security teams by this crush of devices.”
The company also offers encryption solutions ranging from full disk encryption and removable storage to email and server solutions that include the recently announced Symantec PGP Viewer for iOS. Viewer enables employees of organizations with Symantec PGP Universal Server to read encrypted messages on iOS devices including the iPad and iPhone.
Symantec DLP for Tablet will be priced per tablet, the company said. Symantec PGP Viewer for iOS is an Apple iOS application currently available for download from the Apple App Store.
Safend offers endpoint protection for Macs, iPads and iPhones
10 Jan 2011, Dave Neal, V3
Safend has extended the capabilities of its data protection tool for enterprises, adding support for Apple Mac, iPad and iPhone devices.
The security firm said that additions to the Safend Data Protection Suite will protect data on Leopard and Snow Leopard computers.
Safend Protector for Mac controls and generates activity logs relating to physical port access and removable device access.
This means that administrators can trace a data leak directly to its source, if not spot it as it is occurring, the firm said.
The Data Protection Suite's Inspector tool now inspects and filters data in motion.
This relates to email or web traffic, for example, as well as data taken through physical ports. The latest release can also block and log data leaked through smartphone and tablet synchronisation software such as iTunes.
As such it could help IT teams secure the growing numbers of iPhones and iPads which staff are demanding they be allowed to use in the corporate sphere.
"The rise in the use of Macs and other Apple products allows increased productivity within organisations, but also brings new security concerns," said Edy Almer, vice president of product management at Safend.
"With the Data Protection Suite's ability to protect Macs and manage the content-aware application control channel, organisations no longer have to prohibit the use of devices previously deemed risky for the enterprise."
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