Data-loss prevention players link products

Data-loss prevention vendors Fidelis Security Systems and Verdasys today announced they are taking steps to integrate their DLP products for the sake of customers that may use both.

Fidelis specializes in network-based DLP with its Extrusion Prevention System (EPS) appliance, while the Verdasys Digital Guardian is a host-based IPS that can run on desktop and server computers and other devices, including the BlackBerry. (Compare data leak protection products.) 

David Etue, vice president of product development at Fidelis, and Mark Thompson, who holds the same title at Verdasys, laid out a strategy that calls for stages of product integration, starting this summer.

"In the first phase, the Digital Guardian management server would be able to share alert information with Fidelis," Thompson says. The first phase would also allow the two products to share reports.

Etue says Fidelis expects that to occur within two months, and that the next step would entail tackling the "policy side of the equation" so that both vendors' products can be configured to reflect a shared policy framework.

At this point, there are no plans to extend technology integration to allow one product to manage the other, though there are discussions underway to determine whether to attempt that in the future.

Fidelis and Verdasys say that customers -- in particular IBM, which is a reseller -- have been asking for the technology integration push. The two firms emphasize that although they are embarking on this unprecedented joint effort, which will also include tandem product marketing efforts, Fidelis and Verdasys have not discussed merging and there are no plans to combine the two firms.