IBM and Cisco Thursday said they would tie together products that would give customers better network access control and help prevent worm and virus attacks.
IBM and Cisco Thursday said they would tie together products that would give customers better network access control and help prevent worm and virus attacks.
The companies said updates to IBM’s Tivoli software would work with Cisco network gear to scan devices trying to connect to corporate networks. The collaboration would ensure devices allowed to access the network were compliant with network security policies. The products could also isolate, or quarantine, those client devices not compliant to a virtual LAN where they could be evaluated.
Cisco integrated its Access Control Server (ACS) – a RADIUS-based authentication server – and IBM Tivoli Security Compliance Manager software to determine what devices and which users can gain access to a network as well as if those devices had specific features such as proper anti-virus software. IBM Tivoli Security Compliance Manager is software that lets customers define security policies and monitor compliance of those policies.
For example, a Tivoli software agent installed on a user endpoint would capture the device credentials and scan those against pre-set policies in the compliance software, installed on a dedicated server. At that point, the device credentials are passed onto ACS for further interrogation. If deemed “up to snuff,” the device is granted access.
If not, IBM Tivoli Provisioning Manager – a software distribution product – would scan the device to check to see if it could provide the appropriate patches to let the device gain access. If not, the software would alert IT staff to the device’s presence in the quarantined area and notify them to take appropriate actions.
“The products will work together to access and provision network services based on identity. The two in concert can get a very granular picture of who is trying to gain access and what is on the machine at the time,” says Dave King, director of business development for the security technology group at Cisco.
The combined effort, set to be available in December, draws on technology Cisco uses in its Network Admission Control (NAC) initiative, through which the company partners with anti-virus vendors to scan client devices and determine if they can gain access to the network. The Cisco/IBM effort, the companies say, is a step beyond NAC in that it takes into consideration more than virus definitions. For example, the Tivoli compliance software will scan for operating systems, patches, firewalls, applications such as Kazaa, and viruses to determine if a device can gain access.
The joint effort could let customers eliminate some of the guesswork in granting network access, industry watchers say.
“The two companies realized they can’t do it all alone and that them working together will help customers get a handle on the authentication nightmare of employees connecting all over the place,” says Chris Byrnes, senior vice president of security at Meta Group.
