Apani Urges Enterprises To Look To Software For Global Security
Every day the headlines reveal the real-world impact of security breaches. Millions and even billions in dollars, trust and brand value are lost when the security of enterprise data is violated. The issues abound from the loss of protecting private customer data, loss of trade secrets and exposure to financial information.
Corporations have historically invested heavily in perimeter firewalls relying on a "moat-and-castle" approach to protect servers and business-critical data within the corporate network. One trend having a dramatic impact on these efforts is the rapid proliferation of web services and remote access tools for off-shore development teams, remote workers and contractors. This has led to a world without walls, thereby rendering the network perimeter ineffective and putting corporations at risk of an insider attack.
In addition to the demise of the network perimeter, legal regulations governing personal and business information require fundamental changes to the corporate network and server virtualization adds an additional layer of complexity to the security infrastructure. It's a continuous battle to provide robust data security without hindering the strategic objectives of the enterprise. Needless to say, CIOs and CISOs don't have much peace of mind.
The solution according to 5-year-old security software innovator, Apani, can be summed up in four words: cross-platform server isolation. Cross-platform server isolation proactively eliminates vulnerabilities within the corporate network by isolating servers, endpoints and business critical data, into security zones regardless of their platform or physical location. Access to these zones is strictly controlled based on policy while communications are optionally and selectively encrypted. Cross-platform server isolation provides the flexibility and efficiency not available with traditional hardware-based network security solutions, and proactively mitigates risk in the event a breach should occur.
Cross-platform server isolation has become the mantra for Apani, a company whose core technology was an outgrowth of a U.S. government grant to create an open, yet secure, network communication system to be used in the event of a nuclear war. "The vision of cross-platform server isolation is simple," said Ryan Malone, vice president of marketing at Apani. "First, isolate servers, endpoints and data into one or more security zones that aren't constrained by physical location or computing platform. Then, control access to those zones based on granular, configurable policies and efficiently and selectively encrypt communications between the resources in each zone. It's an evolutionary improvement over reconfiguring the network for each policy change and it addresses the reality that most large companies are heterogeneous environments."
"The ability to deploy policy based on logical security associations, rather than physical, offers a lot of flexibility and value to IT organizations because it eliminates many of the complexities faced by large enterprises," said Lawrence Orans, research director at Stamford, Conn.-based Gartner Inc. "Creating logical security associations makes it easier for CISOs to proactively eliminate threats within the corporate network."
Traditional security solutions like network firewalls and VLANs have historically been hard to manage. Their shortcomings have been illuminated with the demise of the "moat-and-castle" approach to security and have therefore caused real business challenges within corporate IT environments. The organic growth of corporate networks, combined with the deployment of hundreds to even thousands of firewalls, in a large enterprise introduces unnecessary costs and complex management and maintenance issues with security policy changes. The need to secure heterogeneous environments eliminates many software-based solutions from consideration, and the explosion in server virtualization adds another layer of security concerns.
Apani EpiForce, the company's flagship product, is a software-based alternative to using network firewalls and VLANs for security inside the corporate network. EpiForce eliminates much of the costs associated with securing the corporate network, while introducing an unprecedented level of flexibility and efficiency to security administrators. EpiForce delivers on Apani's vision of cross-platform server isolation through two powerful disciplines – logical security zoning and policy-based encryption of data in motion.
Computers are assigned membership into one or more logical security zones, creating a flexible, layered security approach within the corporate network. Logical security zones can be based on applications, IP addresses, ports, geographic regions, and users groups – almost any factor. Logical security zones offer a superior, software-based alternative to traditional network segmentation accomplished through network firewalls and VLANs.
Encryption has played a valuable role as a means to secure communications, yet most solutions take an ‘all or nothing' approach that's inflexible. Apani incorporated policy-based encryption that uses the same granular policy principals it has implemented in its zoning. EpiForce takes a unique two-pronged approach to encryption – delivering an efficient, low-overhead encryption mechanism and enabling security administrators to selectively deploy encryption policy at the port level.
"There's a fundamental need for IT organizations to protect business critical resources within the corporate network without hindering the company from achieving its strategic goals," Malone continued. "The realization of cross-platform server isolation through EpiForce delivers on that vision, and finally gives CIOs and CISOs the peace of mind they've been waiting for." -
About Apani
Apani is the preeminent provider of cross-platform server isolation solutions for large companies. Apani's solution isolates and secures the communication between servers and endpoints without regard to operating system or physical location.
Apani EpiForce, the company's flagship product, is a software-based alternative to using firewalls and VLANs inside the corporate network. EpiForce enables two powerful disciplines – logical security zoning and policy-based encryption of data in motion. EpiForce is a distributed, centrally-managed solution that is transparent to users, applications and infrastructure – making it quicker to deploy and less costly to manage than hardware-centric solutions. Policy enforced by EpiForce is persistent, which enables protected resources to be relocated without compromising security.
Providing an evolutionary improvement in efficiency, flexibility, manageability and total cost of ownership, Apani technology is used by much of the Fortune 500.
Based in Southern California, Apani was founded in 2003 and is privately held. More information about the company may be found at www.apnani.com.
SOURCE: Apani