RSA extends security tools to VMware

EMC's RSA division is embracing the virtualisation trend that its VMware spinoff helped kick off, announcing that three of its core security products will work in VMware virtualised environments.

Enterprise users of RSA products are gradually migrating from purely physical to purely virtual computing and storage and will be operating hybrid environments for some time, said Sam Curry, chief technology officer of RSA's GTM (Go-To-Market) organization. They are moving toward the point where applications, data, virtual machines and people will all combine on the fly and software will have to ensure that each piece is added to the mix securely, he said.

On Thursday, RSA announced that its SecurID authentication product, enVision security monitoring software and DLP (Data Loss Prevention) Endpoint all work with VMware virtualized environments in their latest versions.

SecurID, a two-factor authentication system that requires an automatically generated passcode from a portable device, can now authenticate users who need to access virtual sessions on virtual desktops. Administrators can integrate SecurID into VMware View, vSphere Management Assistant and VMware ESX Service Console, RSA said.

RSA has extended the enVision SIEM (security information and event management) tool to gather information on events and administrator actions in both physical and virtual environments. It can report on both in the same set of controls. The events and actions that it can report on will help enterprises make security decisions and maintain compliance with their policies, RSA said. The enVision platform has a new collector component that can pick up more than 350 events from VMware, the company said. The SIEM platform works with both VMware View and VMware vSphere environments.

To prevent leaks of data from virtual desktops within a VMware View environment, RSA's DLP Endpoint can now discover sensitive information and enforce controls across desktop and laptop computers that are used to access virtual desktops, as well as on conventional PC-based operating systems. Administrators can configure policies for both types of clients from a central location, enforcing them with a variety of actions, such as blocking a user's access to certain data or notifying IT staff to manage activity, Curry said.

Also, RSA announced that the latest version of SecurID and enVision have been validated to work with Vblock Infrastructure Packages, the pre-integrated data-center packages introduced last November by EMC, Cisco and VMware. Vblocks include virtualization, networking, computing, storage, security and management products from the three vendors, in tested and validated combinations.