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Breaking News - Security:

Partners Support Network Access Protection Technology From MS

In his keynote at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference, Mike Nash, corporate vice president for Security Business and Technology Unit at Microsoft Corp, announced support from more than 25 industry partners for its Network Access Protection, an extensible standards-based technology that will enable users to more securely access their corporate network. In addition to enhancing the security for user access, the Network Access Protection technology will provide a more secure solution designed to reduce the complexity of network access for IT administrators. Available in an update release (code-named "R2") of Windows Server 2003, Network Access Protection technology will deliver a uniform method for detecting the "health state" of a client attempting to connect to a network, restricting the access until compliance to policy is validated and updating the client to current security policy levels.

"IT administrators have told us that managing user access to their corporate resources in a safe and secure manner is a major concern," Nash said. "Network Access Protection has garnered broad industry support because it will help customers lower the cost of access management while simultaneously providing them with more control."

"Juniper Networks is delighted to be working with Microsoft to integrate user, application and network policy and enforcement in a seamless manner," said George Riedel, vice president of strategy and corporate development at Juniper Networks Inc. "By working with Microsoft on Network Access Protection, we are furthering Juniper's commitment to open, multivendor standards to facilitate more secure network user access so our customers can be assured of a trusted IT environment and user experience."

Network Access Protection technologies allow IT professionals to monitor and control network access based on validation of a computer's compliance to pre-established policies. Network access policies are defined and managed by network administrators and managed by a central "policy coordination server." Network Access Protection technologies provide three distinct functionalities to help corporate IT administrators improve security of their network clients:

• Network policy validation determines whether a networked client machine is compliant with IT-defined network access policies at the point of network entry.
• Network restriction automatically restricts noncompliant client machines to a separate, restricted network where updates and utilities -- for example, patch updates or virus signature updates -- are available to bring the client back to the desired health state. This restricted network can also be used as a "guest access" network for users without proper network credentials where Internet access is still desirable.
• Network policy compliance gives the IT administrator the tools to bring noncompliant client machines back to a desired health state. The update and remediation process occurs while the client is isolated to the restricted network. Once the client machine has been updated, the client is automatically revalidated for network access.

Broad Industry Support

Network Access Protection is an extensible architecture based on industry-accepted standards. Today, more than 25 industry leaders including client security with anti-virus, firewall, intrusion detection and intrusion prevention vendors, patch management vendors, networking vendors and systems integrators announced their support for the Network Access Protection technology. Together, Microsoft and industry partners will develop a breadth of applications and end-to-end solutions for their customers.

Network Access Protection industry partners include the following:

• Client Security

Anti-Virus, Firewall, Intrusion Detection and Prevention Vendors:

• Computer Associates.
• Internet Security Systems Inc.
• McAfee.
• Symantec.
• Trend Micro.

Connectivity Services:

• iPass.

Endpoint Policy Management/Enforcement:

• ENDFORCE.
• SecureWave.
• Sygate.
• TruSecure Corp.

Management/Patch Management Vendors:

• Altiris.
• BigFix.
• BindView.
• Citrix.
• HP.
• LANDesk Software.
• Microsoft Systems Management Server (SMS) 2003.
• Pedestal Software.
• Shavlik.

Networking Vendors:

• Enterasys.
• Extreme Networks.
• Foundry.
• ProCurve Networking by HP.
• Juniper Networks.

Systems Integrators:

• Avanade.

• Capgemini.

• HP.

• PricewaterhouseCoopers.