Mashing up for security

One of the best factors about the cloud is the way it eases the path for vendors that offer complementary applications or services to partner up and create a new service that many users will find to better than the sum of the parts. This is often because the resultant mashup service has optimised all the necessary engineering required to join the individual elements together.

Take, for example, the partnership between cloud-based IT governance, risk and compliance producer, TraceSecurity, and GFI Software with its range of security and management-related tools.

The pair have reached a joint product development agreement that will integrate GFI’s network security scanner and patch management capabilities into TraceSecurity’s flagship security and compliance software solution, TraceCSO.

“The work with TraceSecurity will help to drive the automation of highly technical processes deeper into cloud-based security solutions. This will support a broader and deeper set of industries that are already struggling against increasing security risks and mandates, and shrinking security resources.”

“There is a clear winner in this strategy,” said Peter Stewart, president and CEO of TraceSecurity, in making today’s announcement. “And, that ‘winner’ is our customers and GFI Software clients around the world. This development agreement represents a quantum leap forward for us in the level of technical detail that we can provide to TraceCSO customers.”

As a result of the integration efforts with GFI’s scanner and patch management tools, TraceCSO clients will be able to use the TraceSecurity software solution as a deployment engine for security updates, and a data collection tool to help drive system inventory and improve configuration and vulnerability scanning.

The results are expected to include the delivery of patch management capabilities, which will provide visibility into the risk profile across technical systems, providing a mechanism for remediating patch management through cloud-based, centralised resources. It will also cover asset management, which will automate the process, delivering real-time visibility of current resources based on actual endpoint functionality and inline hardware/software assets.

Configuration management toolswill enable collection of detailed configuration settings based on endpoint functionality and allow users to reconcile inconsistencies directly from the source, and in real-time, while vulnerability management tools will collect date directly from the endpoint and integrate it into vulnerability scan data. As a result, users will be able to identify vulnerabilities and security concerns that are otherwise not detectable through normal scanning.

“Our company’s driving goal is to provide businesses with all the solutions they need to effectively monitor, manage and secure their IT environments,” said Sergio Galindo, general manager for the Infrastructure Business Unit of GFI Software. “The work with TraceSecurity will help to drive the automation of highly technical processes deeper into cloud-based security solutions. This will support a broader and deeper set of industries that are already struggling against increasing security risks and mandates, and shrinking security resources.”