* Industry starts to converge on Cisco’s approach to access control
In one week, the industry’s picture of network access control has shifted dramatically. We went from two major efforts, led by Cisco and Microsoft and announced over the summer, to one.
Cisco was the big winner.
The first major company to convert was Computer Associates, which last week said it would integrate its eTrust anti-spyware and anti-virus products into Cisco’s Network Admission Control (NAC) program. Then Cisco and IBM said they would work together to make IBM’s Tivoli network management software integrate with technology Cisco uses for NAC.
Finally, Microsoft this week decided to push off its own program for two years – and to bring it in line with Cisco’s NAC initiative.
Both programs – NAC and Microsoft’s Network Access Protection, or NAP – aim to prevent unprotected or underprotected computers from attaching to an organization’s network. The idea is that if a laptop, for instance, tries to connect, it should not only be virus-free but also have all the latest patches and anti-virus updates so that it doesn’t affect others on the network. These programs are intended to ensure compliance with company policies automatically.
As I discussed in a newsletter this summer, it had seemed that we were in for a NAP-vs.-NAC battle. Network hardware vendors whose names were not Cisco had seemed to line up behind Microsoft.
But now it appears that the whole issue has been defused. Frankly, we’re all be better off if Microsoft and Cisco can work together on this problem, one that is serious enough and broad enough in scope to warrant cooperation among all the big industry players.
