Nexsan Extends Secure Storage Market Leadership With New Assureon 4.0 Appliance
Nexsan Technologies, the leader in innovative storage solutions, today announced the Assureon 4.0, a next-generation enterprise storage security appliance that incorporates a broad range of data storage applications into a single, integrated solution, eliminating the cost and complexity of deploying multiple single-function appliances.
Nexsan's Assureon 4.0 is a scalable plug-and-play secure storage solution that delivers the highest levels of data security by combining hardware-accelerated data encryption with remote data replication and integrated information lifecycle management (ILM). The Assureon 4.0 appliance is built around a "hardened" disk-based archive with an elite set of storage applications designed to meet the customer's backup, disaster recovery, security and compliance standards while delivering fast, easy and continuous access to fixed-content data at the lowest possible cost per terabyte. This de-duplication functionality extends Assureon's backup appliance operations to control the number of instances of a file in the store.
Assureon's secure storage is based on a single-instance content-addressed storage (CAS) model, ensuring that only a single copy of a data object is stored in the system, dramatically reducing capacity demands and bandwidth requirements and significantly slashing customer costs.
Nexsan's innovative CAS implementation uniquely positions the Assureon 4.0 as the only CAS-based disaster prevention appliance, in contrast with conventional disaster recovery products. Compared to other CAS-based products that require backup or replicated data to be restored to a primary vehicle, Assureon provides individual file or complete directory Point-in-Time rollbacks to deliver immediate data reacquisition in full file format. With Assureon 4.0's unlimited versioning capability, customers can determine how many copies of a file they require to meet specific requirements and ensure complete business continuity. If primary storage fails, data access can automatically failover to Assureon without the need for an extra data restoration procedure, providing uninterrupted business continuity. Traditional CAS products can only start the time-consuming data restoration process after the primary storage has been repaired or replaced.
Unlike standalone security appliances, Nexsan designed the Assureon 4.0 to deliver unmatched storage security with comprehensive data management tools and storage management applications, including remote data replication, ILM and data destruction certification to meet regulatory compliance requirements.
"Storage and IT administrators are still struggling with the cost and complexity of planning, deploying and protecting enterprise storage," said Brendan Kinkade, Vice President of Marketing at Nexsan. "Assureon 4.0 directly addresses these issues with an integrated, scalable and turnkey solution that encompasses storage security, business continuity and regulatory compliance in a single appliance. No one else offers this level of functionality and value for enterprise storage customers."
Assureon 4.0 provides an unmatched feature set of extensive data security measures, including 256-bit AES encryption, authentication, tamper-proof time stamping, serialization and self auditing, and positive destruction of individual encryption keys to assure that the destroyed information is unreadable, including files stored on removable tape and optical media.
A cornerstone of Nexsan's secure storage platform is high performance, ensuring that files protected as part of an Assureon secure archive can be accessed transparently and without delay by any authorized users. To meet this requirement Assureon 4.0 features hardware-based CAS and encryption acceleration, eliminating the performance bottlenecks associated with software-based methods. Additional performance optimization ensures that Assureon delivers top performance for other storage management operations, including user-scheduled audit processes that scan and monitor all files in the Assureon archive to ensure data and media integrity. If an error is detected, the damaged file is automatically replaced with a known good copy from a secondary location. This secondary copy may reside on the Assureon system or on removable media.
Assureon 4.0 is a true enterprise solution with the ability to protect and manage any data, independent of the location and the media. In addition to the standard disk-based archive, Assureon 4.0 offers enhanced support for removable optical disk and tape media. Since all Assureon data is encrypted, customer confidentiality is fully protected in the event of the loss of an optical disk or tape cartridge. Assureon 4.0 can also enable asynchronous remote replication for an additional layer of data protection.
Assureon's file-based encryption technology delivers improved performance and more granular management and disposition of encryption keys. By using individual file encryption and not a block- or bit-based approach, Assureon eliminates any performance degradation, allowing files to be read back in real time. Additionally, Assureon is the only storage security appliance that supports the deletion of encryption keys on an individual file basis, across all supported media, including disk, optical and even WORM tape.
Assureon 4.0 is now available at extremely competitive pricing through Nexsan's worldwide channel of system integrators and value-added resellers.
About Nexsan Technologies
Nexsan Technologies, headquartered in Woodland Hills, Calif., has changed the way IT managers are storing and protecting corporate data. From the outset, Nexsan has moved to the forefront because it recognized the need for corporate managers to 'do with less.' Nexsan was the first to deliver award-winning storage solutions that provide correct-cost pricing, without sacrificing features and performance -- attributes that make good business sense for virtually every size company. Every Nexsan product is a total solution, with unprecedented ease of use, features, performance and reliability, all priced to fit the requirements of IT managers worldwide. For more information, please see the company's website at www.nexsan.com.