CA adds to ID mgmt. line

In a deal with InfoSec, Computer Associates  Tuesday announced it had acquired technology that will enhance CA's eTrust portfolio with the ability to automatically identify and remove obsolete, unused and rogue user IDs and access rights.

Dubbed eTrust Cleanup, CA has been reselling the product as a third-party solution for the past two years. The software, essentially InfoSec's mainframe identity and access management solution that protects enterprise IT environments by removing unused IDs, automates the process of deprovisioning users, CA says. Provisioning is the assignment and management of user access rights to applications and resources; deprovisioning is the removal of those rights due to termination of employment, changes in job function, physical relocation, and other factors.

Financial details of the deal were not disclosed.

According to Stephen Elliot, a senior analyst with IDC, customers are consolidating products and vendor relationships. Vendors such as CA could benefit in customer perception from owning the intellectual property rather than just partnering to resell.

This technology acquisition is the latest in CA's quest to pump up its identity and access management suite. Last year CA announced it would acquire Netegrity in a deal valued at $430 million and that added Netegrity's SiteMinder Web access management product and the IdentityMinder modules for self-service identity administration and provisioning to CA's product arsenal.

CA's strategy with Netegrity in the long term entails delivering a new product for provisioning that would include features such as discovery, asset management, federated provisioning and compliance management. At that point, CA would offer a migration path to eTrust Admin and IdentityMinder eProvision customers.

ETrust Cleanup supports z/OS and z/OS.e systems, and requires eTrust CA-ACF2 Security r6.4 for z/OS or higher or eTrust CA-Top Secret Security r5.2 for z/OS or higher.  It is available immediately.