advantages of integrated messaging security...2 advantages of integrated messaging security...

Advantages ofIntegrated Messaging Security

This document was custom researched and prepared by Richi Jennings Associates

and sponsored by Symantec Corp.

About the Author and this Document

Richi Jennings is an accomplished, multi-functional veteran of the messaging

world. He has worked with cutting edge messaging technologies since 1985, in a

wide variety of roles.

He now analyses, consults, writes, and speaks on messaging topics, including

messaging security. He’s an excellent out-of-the-box thinker, known for his refresh-

ing approach, insight, and professionalism.

He’s a frequent keynote speaker at major events such as INBOX, NetworkWorld,

LinuxWorld, HP World, and Inbox/Outbox; he is often interviewed and quoted in

media such as CNBC, NPR, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, USA

Today, Red Herring, INC., CIO Magazine, eWEEK, Information Week, and

Network World.

You can contact Richi at [email protected] and read his weblog at

www.richi.co.uk

Richi Jennings Associates independently conducted all research for this document

and retained full editorial control. Symantec commissioned this white paper with

full distribution rights.

All trademarks hereby acknowledged.

Contents

Executive Overview .....................................................................................................2

Introduction ...............................................................................................................3

Multi-Vendor Security Thinking.....................................................................................................3

Should You Combine Point Products Today?.................................................................................3

Who Should Be My Vendor? ...........................................................................................................4

The Shift to Integrated Solutions ................................................................................5

“Infrastructure” vs. “Applications” .................................................................................................5

Leave It to the Experts ....................................................................................................................6

Multi-Vendor Anti-Virus Unnecessary ...........................................................................................7

TCO and ROI ...................................................................................................................................8

Vendor Consolidation .....................................................................................................................9

One-Stop Shopping Makes it Easy ...............................................................................................10

Technical Synergies Drive Integration ..........................................................................................11

Policy and Regulatory Compliance ............................................................................ 12

What Is It? .....................................................................................................................................12

Why Do I Want It? ........................................................................................................................12

Management Synergies Drive Integration ................................................................................... 15

Symantec’s EMM Strategy ......................................................................................... 15

What is EMM? ............................................................................................................................... 15

Integrating Other Useful Features ................................................................................................16

A Vision for a Complete Messaging Solution ............................................................................... 16

The Symantec Advantage ..............................................................................................................16

Execution—Not Just Words or “Branding” .................................................................................. 17

Market Leadership ........................................................................................................................ 17

Conclusions .............................................................................................................. 18

Shifts in Buying Trends .................................................................................................................18

BenefitsofanIntegratedApproach ..............................................................................................18

TCOSavings,ROIBenefits ...........................................................................................................19

Right Place, Right Time ................................................................................................................19

Creative Commons License .......................................................................................20

Advantages of Integrated Messaging Security

2


Executive Overview

Buying trends are shifting,asorganizationsgraspthebenefitsofanintegratedapproachto

email security purchasing.

It’s become a statement of faith that the best way to secure messaging infrastructures is to collect

several point products together in order to have best-of-breed solutions. While this was a good idea

a few years ago, it’s now a dangerous fallacy.

Self-integration of point products is no longer the best policy. It’s usually better to select an

integrated solution. This reduces wasted IT effort, allows centralized management, consolidates

vendor relationships, and should permit a single support resource.

The bottom line is that an integrated approach should cost less. Replacing a collection of point

products with a comprehensive, integrated messaging security solution should show a positive

return on investment.

3


Introduction

MULTI-VENDOR SECURITY THINKING

Many organizations purchase their messaging security solutions from several different vendors.

For example, they might buy anti-virus software from one vendor, an anti-spam appliance from

another,andinstantmessagingfilteringfromathirdvendor.Theymightevenemployseveral

different layers of anti-virus technologies, all from different vendors.

This is often thought of as a best practice, because IT managers believe they need to purchase their

messaging security components from several different vendors in order to have best-of-breed

solutions. They believe it to be a sensible, pragmatic approach to the problem.

Why do IT managers combine point products?A few years ago, the idea of buying several messaging security components from different vendors

made perfect sense. After all, new market entrants such as Brightmail were providing remarkably

effective, point-product solutions to problems such as email spam. Traditional security vendors

weren’tabletodoaseffectiveajobatcombatingthespamfloodofpornography,scams,and

advertisements for suspicious pills.

These new entrants were aggressive, venture-funded startups, which began to offer enhanced

messaging security services. The market quickly came to the conclusion that some of these

new entrants were offering solutions that exceeded the performance of products from

incumbent vendors.

As a result, the market adopted these new, best-of-breed point products, to solve

individual problems.

SHOULD YOU COMBINE POINT PRODUCTS TODAY?

However,there’slittleornojustificationtodayforbuyingseveralpointproductstosolve

messaging security problems. As we’ll see later, there are plenty of good reasons why organizations

should solve all their messaging security problems with a single, integrated product line.

Whereas a few years ago it was the small, narrowly-focused vendors that offered state-of-the-art

performance, today there are vendors who do a state-of-the-art job in all areas.

4


Why Not Integrate Your Own Solution?The disadvantages of combining point products add up to a substantially increased TCO (total cost

of ownership) and decreased ROI (return on investment). The main downsides are:

• Wasted IT effort

• Chaotic reporting and measurement

• Unnecessary hardware and software expenditure

Why Select a Single, Integrated Solution? The Upsides of a single-vendor purchasing strategy are:

• Consolidation of IT effort

• Centralized management, operations, and reporting

• Single point of contact for purchase, advice, and support

These advantages should add up to a substantially improved TCO and ROI. However, such

improvements can only be realized with the right choice of vendor.

WHO SHOULD BE MY VENDOR?

An organization that wishes to employ an integrated, single-vendor strategy for its messaging

security should have a trusted, expert vendor partner that can foster deep business insights.

In addition, the vendor needs to be state-of-the-art in all areas of messaging security. It’s no

good replacing a collection of state-of-the-art technologies with a set of mediocre technologies from

a single vendor.

In the case of Symantec, the company has consistently demonstrated its commitment to the

messaging security market. In our opinion, no vendor has better strategic investments in the

technologies required to be best-of-breed in all areas.

The proof is in Symantec’s recent acquisitions. Key among these are:

Brightmail—generally recognized as the cream of the recent anti-spam startups

TurnTide—extremely innovative, forward-thinking network-level protection; thwarts spammers

without losing legitimate email by slowing down their connections until they give up

IMLogic—justifiablyseenastheleaderinsecurity,compliance,andidentitymanagementof

instant messaging

In our opinion, no

vendor has better

strategic invest-

ments in best-of-

breed technologies

than Symantec

5


Veritas—the leader in storage management and backup (while not directly related to security, the

Veritas technology usefully rounds out an integrated offering, as we’ll see later)

Of course, it’s one thing to acquire a portfolio of interesting technologies from startups, but quite

another to successfully integrate them into a cohesive, coherent product line. In our opinion, no

vendor is better placed than Symantec to capitalize on the technology it owns, integrating those

technologies into a true solution, which appropriately applies that technology to support your

businessgoals.Symantechasbuiltanintegratedsolutionthatoffersthebenefitsofintegration

without compromising on the quality of the individual components.

The Shift to Integrated Solutions

As we’ve seen, there’s precious little technical or business reason to purchase messaging security as

a collection of point products. This was probably a good idea a few years ago, but not today.

This section outlines some of the other reasons why it’s advantageous for businesses to take a more

strategic, integrated view of their messaging security purchasing.

“INFRASTRUCTURE” VS. “APPLICATIONS”

Effective security comes from strategic infrastructure design. Security isn’t merely a product

or application that can be bolted on as an afterthought.

Such an infrastructure design is more successful when the technologies chosen to help implement

its security are designed to work together effectively. The infrastructure needs to be designed to be

secure as a whole; it can’t be properly secured by adding point products.

Purchasing Decisions Moving Up the OrganizationFor this reason amongst others, the buying decisions for messaging security are moving higher

within the organization. In the past, purchasing decisions were fragmented across separate teams.

For example, a messaging manager might have been responsible for purchasing an anti-spam point

product, but a content control product was chosen by a security team, with little or no reference to

the anti-spam decision.

Today, it’s increasingly likely that purchase decisions for the entire messaging security infrastruc-

ture are made by more-senior decision makers. More and more organizations see their messaging

infrastructure as being mission critical.

In our opinion, no

vendor is better

placed than

Symantec to

capitalize on the

technology it owns

6


In the 2005 Global Security Survey conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers and CxO Magazine, the

role most responsible for determining which vendors get evaluated was “The senior-most security

executive”(36%ofrespondents)andthevastmajorityoforganizationsidentifiedtheirCEO,CIO,

or CSO as the responsible role (85% of respondents).

Although the IT managers responsible for individual applications within the infrastructure are

important stakeholders in such decision making, the clear trend is now for messaging security to be

planned at a strategic level. This trend helps drive the move to comprehensive, integrated solutions.

When we speak to senior decision makers about messaging security topics, it’s very clear that

there’s a groundswell of desire to move away from the job of integration. These individuals are

seeingthebenefitsofmakingstrategicdecisionstoimplementasingle,coherentmessaging

security solution.

LEAVE IT TO THE EXPERTS

What other reasons are there for senior IT decision makers to prefer a single, comprehensive,

integrated solution? The alternative—a collection of point products—requires IT staff to be experts.

Primarily it requires them to become experts both in integration and security. This is far harder

than most organizations believe, and requires substantial effort to successfully acquire, nurture,

and harness this expertise.

The list of threats to protect against continues to grow—from viruses, through spam and denial-of-

service, to phishing and pharming. As it grows, more and more security and integration expertise

is required to keep track of the threats. That’s why IT departments would prefer to leave critical

functions such as security to the experts.

But this raises an obvious question:

Who Are the Experts?Vendors of best-of-breed point products are generally thought of as experts in their own specialized

areas. Are vendors of integrated solutions also experts, or are they merely generalists trying to do a

“good enough” job across all areas?

As we discussed in the previous section, Symantec is a prime example of an integrated-solution

vendor bringing market leading expertise to the table. Whether this expertise exists inside the

company, or is acquired as a result of mergers, no vendor does a better job of applying its talent to

build messaging security products and services—in our opinion.

In our opinion,

no vendor does a

better job than

Symantec of

applying its talent to

building messaging

security products

and services

7


MULTI-VENDOR ANTI-VIRUS UNNECESSARY

Until recently, many IT managers believed that it was necessary to install AV protection sourced

from several different vendors. The theory is that some threats can occasionally be missed by some

vendors, either because no vendor can be completely comprehensive, or because no vendor can

consistently react quickly to emerging, “zero-day” threats.

Experience has shown this to be a fallacy.

Comprehensive AccuracyThe best vendors quickly and consistently catch new threats, because they have a comprehensive

approach to messaging security. Such an approach optimizes catch rates, false positive rates, time

to response, speed of updates, auditability, and the skill to handle complicated threats such as

polymorphic malware.

The Virus Bulletin organization is a well respected, independent technical media outlet. It conducts

independent comparative tests of AV products, several times per year, known as VB 100%. The tests

measure both accuracy and performance.

The VB 100% logo shows that an AV product detects all “In the Wild” viruses during both on-de-

mandandon-accessscanning,andgeneratesnofalsepositiveswhenscanningasetofcleanfiles.

(The viruses that appear on the test list are known to be active, causing real-world virus incidents.)

At the time of writing, Symantec is the only vendor that has consistently passed every VB 100% test

since November 1999—29 tests in succession. As Virus Bulletin points out, “You should look for

products that have achieved a succession of VB 100% awards, rather than just one or two.”

More information: www.virusbtn.com/vb100

Zero-Day ThreatsThe phrase zero-day refers to the threat of new malware that may not be caught by traditional,

signature-based AV approaches. Several small AV vendors claim that independent tests “prove”

their technology catches emerging malware faster than Symantec. However, such tests do not

appear to compare like-with-like.

These vendors appear to push “experimental” signatures to their engines. Such signatures have

not undergone rigorous testing, and are more likely to cause false positive problems, for example.

Symantec does have experimental signatures available for customers who wish to expose them-

selves to this risk, but most customers prefer to apply updates that have been extensively tested.

8


In addition, Symantec offers zero-day protection, based on heuristic rules. These are frequently up-

dated and “pushed” to the AV engines. These rules are in addition to the traditional signature-based

AV approach used in its AV engine and are offered at no additional fee.

Symantec also uses techniques to detect new malware outbreaks that are similar to those used by

its anti-spam labs. These techniques allow Symantec to identify mutating malware without the need

for updated AV signatures.

Simultaneous Update at All PointsStandardizing on AV solutions from a single family at several points in your infrastructure will give

you improved signature updates.

For example, you could use Symantec’s AV engines at the boundary, email store, and desktop. In

this case, you’d receive updated AV signatures at all points practically simultaneously. Your bound-

ary AV engine would fetch updates within seconds of their availability and can “push” the updates

down to the email store and PCs. This allows maximum protection with a minimum of

overhead.

Risk ManagementUltimately, the decision to implement multi-vendor AV is one of risk management. Any theoretical

additional protection provided by an extra AV layer is likely to be extremely small. A sensible busi-

nessdecisionwouldbethatsuchasmallreductioninriskisnotjustifiedbytheadditionalTCOof

the extra layer.

TCO AND ROI

Here’s one more reason why a single, comprehensive, integrated solution is preferred by senior IT

decision makers—because the alternative is likely to cost far more.

IT departments would prefer not to have to integrate products wherever possible. Integration

requires substantial amounts of IT staff time. This is “dead” time that could be more usefully spent

on productive tasks. The key issues with manual integration are:

• Duplicationofconfigurationdataandpolicies

• Distribution of AV signatures

• Consistency of reporting and tracking

• Consistency of content categorization across all media (email, IM, etc.)

9


It’s a huge hidden cost to the organization. In any TCO analysis prepared by us, the cost of

people’s timeisalmostalwaysthenumberonecontributortotheTCOfigure.

While software licensing costs are usually a secondary consideration in TCO analyses, they will still

besignificant.Aconsolidatedvendorrelationshipshouldleadtocostsavings.

In the 2005 State Of The CIO Study by CIO Magazine, the #1 contribution to their businesses iden-

tifiedbyCIOswas,“Reducingbusinesscoststhroughefficiency/increasedproductivity.”Thesurvey

also revealed that IT departments are increasingly seeing themselves as agents of change, rather

than providing a reactive service to the business.

Another way of looking at this is that replacing a collection of point products with a comprehensive,

integrated messaging security solution should give a positive ROI.

VENDOR CONSOLIDATION

The messaging security market is already showing the classic signs of consolidation. You should be

aware that many of today’s point-product vendors are unlikely to exist through the lifetime of

your investment.

The recent growth of point-product vendors is increasingly driven by replacement business—

therearefewerandfewer“greenfield”opportunitiestoday.Thismarketchurnisaclassiclead-up

to a natural market consolidation, where the number of vendors shrinks dramatically.

As we’ve already seen, Symantec realized this early on and acquired several top choice targets, such

as Brightmail, TurnTide, and IMLogic.

In the near future, the messaging security marketplace will look completely different to that of

today. You should expect to see a few 800lb gorillas in place of hundreds of small vendors. It’s

likely that many point-product vendors will either:

• Be acquired

• Go out of business

• Throw away their own technology and license another’s

• Radically change their business model

• Cease innovating, to exploit an installed-base cash cow

10


This will happen because the messaging security market cannot continue to support the many

loss-making vendors operating in this area. In addition, many either don’t have the expertise or the

intellectualpropertytocompete.Financesarealsogettingsqueezed—unprofitablevendorsarefind-

ing it increasingly hard to raise their next funding round.

Here are just a few out of many recent examples:

• Acquisitions: SecureComputing and Ciphertrust; SurfControl and BlackSpider.

• Out of business: 0spam; Block All Spam; Blue Security.

• Licensed technology: Barbedwire Technologies; Computer Associates;

Sunbelt Software.

• Changed business model: Cloudmark; Habeas.

ONE-STOP SHOPPING MAKES IT EASY

We’ve talked extensively about how an integrated approach is better technically. But choosing an

integrated messaging security solution also simplifies the whole lifecycle—from planning,

through purchasing and deployment, to ongoing support.

PlanAn integrated approach makes the planning process far easier. Designing your security infrastruc-

ture, piloting it, and deciding how to roll it out are all made simple, compared with a non-integrat-

ed, point-product approach. Indeed, as we’ve illustrated before, many of the planning decisions that

should be made in the early stages are quite impossible to foresee when integrating it all yourself.

PurchaseAn integrated approach inevitably means a single vendor. This means vendor relations are simpler,

because there are far fewer individual relationships to maintain. It also gives you an assurance that

knowledgeable people are on call to help you design your entire messaging security infrastructure,

not simply parts of it.

When working with a collection of point-product vendors, vendor help with infrastructure design is

on an as-available basis, at best.

11


DeployNaturally, an integrated approach wins out in ease of deployment. Compared with the self-integra-

tion effort required to roll out several point products, there’s no contest.

Products that are part of an integrated solution will always be quicker to deploy, with fewer unex-

pected issues, and higher quality results.

SupportAn integrated approach should mean an integrated support mechanism. Such one-stop support will

inevitably have a better understanding of your environment than could one vendor’s support

organization from amongst a collection of point product vendors.

In the real world, integration problems arise where different products “touch.” An integrated mix of

solutions that are designed to work together seamlessly will raise fewer support questions. Not only

that, but the questions that do arise should be easier to deal with.

TECHNICAL SYNERGIES DRIVE INTEGRATION

We’ve already discussed several good business and organizational reasons why integrated solutions

are preferable to a collection of point products. There are also sound technical reasons.

Many of these are connected with the synergy that can be achieved when protecting different ap-

plications with integrated products from the same portfolio.

Example of Technical SynergyAn increasing amount of email spam is being blocked by employing a good understanding of

IP reputation—that is, remembering whether previous email content from this part of the Internet

has been good or bad. If the reputation of a sender is poor, it’s far more likely that email from that

source is spam, phishing, virus infected, or otherwise undesirable.

However, that same reputation information can be reused to secure other applications, such as

instant messaging. If a sender’s reputation is poor for email, it’s also more likely that IMs from that

location will be undesirable—for example, attempting to spread a Trojan horse.

Forthisreason,it’susefultointegrateemailsecurityandIMsecurity.Integrationbringsbenefits

such as greater accuracy, quicker responsiveness, and fewer false positives.

12


Policy and Regulatory Compliance

WHAT IS IT?

Vendors of integrated messaging security solutions are increasingly incorporating outbound

content scanning technologies. These aim to address the ever-growing policy and regulatory

compliance requirements of organizations.

Broadly, the vendors set out to ensure that sensitive information is only transmitted to authorized

personnel. The main types of information protected by policy and regulatory compliance

technologies are intellectual property and sensitive customer data—for example, product plans

and consumers’ credit card details.

Policy compliance technologies aim to prevent individuals from accidentally violating

organizational policies. For example, they could stop a well-meaning employee from emailing a

press release before its embargo date. In this case, the organization might mandate a policy that

only members of the PR Team may email press releases outside the company.

More sophisticated policy compliance technology knows what the company’s press releases

generallylooklike,usingsimilartechnologytothatwhichallowsanti-spamfilterstoknowwhat

spam looks like.

While some vendors would have you believe that Compliance is a brand new technology and

therefore a distinctly separate market segment, the facts say otherwise. A competent vendor of

comprehensive, integrated messaging security solutions will also offer sophisticated compliance

as part of its portfolio.

WHY DO I WANT IT?

Increasingly, the need for policy and/or regulatory compliance is motivating C-level interest in

these technologies, because they can help you to:

• Prevent leakage of secrets and private customer data

• Encourage correct employee behavior

• Permit a full range of communication for a competitive edge

• Prepare for the future

13


Prevent Leakage of Secrets and Private Customer DataWell-run businesses have policies in place to ensure that their intellectual property remains pri-

vate. Data such as product designs, future product plans, and marketing strategies lose their value

when exposed to competitors.

Similarly, customers entrust many companies with personal data, which businesses must keep

private. Where the protection of personal data was a minor consideration for consumers a few years

ago,severalrecenthigh-profilebreachesofthattrusthavechangedthestatus quo.

Ultimately, the costs of a major consumer privacy violation are enough to overwhelm the most

cash-rich business. The direct and indirect costs of such an event include:

• Crisis PR—traditional press and non-traditional media outlets treat consumer privacy

issues as a big story. Effectively managing communications related to such a crisis is

expensive, both in terms of PR department time and the opportunity cost of distractions to

executive spokespersons.

• Brand image loss—consumers increasingly pay attention to a company’s reputation fo

privacy, and prefer not to do business with those they feel will treat their personal

information in a cavalier fashion.

• Remediation—organizations that leak private information will be expected to try to put

right the damage. For example, by paying for the services of a credit monitoring service

that warns consumers that their private data has been misused.

• Compensation—organizations that leak private information may choose to compensate

wronged consumers, either monetarily or in kind.

• Legal costs—privacy or regulatory compliance violations can result in expensive civil or

criminal action against an organization or its executives. According to Gartner Group,

there are typically 75-100 open lawsuits relating to email liability at any given time. The

typical cost of each suit before judgments or settlements is $1.2 - $1.4 million.

Clearly, the potential costs of non-compliance are far greater than the costs of investing in

becoming compliant.

14


Encourage Correct Employee BehaviorCompliance solutions can automatically re-educate employees on the correct use of technologies

such as email and instant messaging. They can ask the employee questions such as Did you really

mean to send that? It looks like confidential information.

Ultimately, it can warn management of the potential attempt to leak data (although in most

organizations this feature should be used with caution).

No compliance technology can guarantee protection against a determined, malicious insider. How-

ever, it’s a good way to prevent mistakes made by inexperienced or stressed employees.

Automatically Track Changing Regulations and InterpretationCompliance solutions should not only help your employees comply with internal policies, but also

help your organization comply with external regulations—such as HIPPA, SOX, and the Basel ac-

cords.

However, regulations change. More importantly, so do the legal interpretations of those

regulations, as the legal profession builds up a body of case law.

A competent vendor of compliance solutions should employ legal experts to track these changes.

The vendor should “push” updated rules that embody these changes in regulations and their

interpretations. This helps you to automatically stay in a state of compliance, further reducing

your TCO and improving your ROI.

Permit a Full Range of Communication for a Competitive EdgeOrganizations that are concerned about the risk of messaging misuse—especially newer media such

as instant messaging—may restrict or block the use of such technologies. If you implement a

compliance solution, there should be no need to block legitimate use in this way. That gives you an

immediate competitive advantage over those who have chosen to lose functionality in the name

of risk management.

And as we’ve noted before, if that compliance solution is part of a coherent, integrated product

line, you’ll enjoy a greater ROI than you would if you implement compliance as a separate, point

product.

Prepare for the Future The technologies behind messaging and communications don’t stand still. Organizations that

choose an integrated product line of messaging security solutions make it easier for themselves to

secure future additions to their communications infrastructure.

15


Another example is the increasing use of IP telephony. This area includes the use of SIP-based

VoIP phone products designed for the enterprise, or the creeping, viral growth of repurposed con-

sumer products such as Skype or Windows Live Messenger.

Competent integrated messaging security solutions allow new technologies to be secured with the

minimum of effort, re-engineering, or custom integration.

MANAGEMENT SYNERGIES DRIVE INTEGRATION

An integrated solution is easier to manage than a collection of point products. One reason for

this involves the intent behind the management of the components. This is because there are often

synergies between what IT is trying to achieve across several messaging media.

Example of Management SynergySuppose an organization has a policy preventing certain types of discussion. It will usually want to

prevent such discussion across all media—such as email and instant messaging.

If the organization’s policy compliance components for email and IM are separate, IT would have to

configurethesamepolicytwice.This duplication of effort is wasteful and error-prone. However,

if the compliance technology was integrated, IT’s job is made simpler, with less risk of mistakes.

Symantec’s EMM Strategy

WHAT IS EMM?

Symantec’s strategy for its integrated messaging security solutions is known as Enterprise

Messaging Management.

It encompasses all the areas that we discussed earlier. It also includes additional functionality to

offer a broad, holistic approach to securing, managing, and operating messaging infrastructures.

16


INTEGRATING OTHER USEFUL FEATURES

In addition to security, there are additional features that enhance the IT messaging experience.

For example:

• Storage optimization—ensuringthatmessagingstoresrunefficiently,withhigh

performance, optimum scalability, and minimum wastage

• Archiving and legal “discovery”—storage of all communications and tools

toefficientlyquerythearchive,incaseofcourt-ordereddiscoveryrequests,forexample

• Availability—sophisticated storage tools to permit quick disaster recovery, for example

• Backup/recovery—longer-term storage of data, in case of disaster

• Oversight—monitoring, reporting, message tracking, etc.

Symantec is adding features such as these to its messaging security offering, forming an integrated

solution that addresses every key IT requirement connected with a messaging infrastructure.

While not a focus area for this paper, these additional features are of great importance for IT

departments. They help ensure that the messaging infrastructure is always available, can be

recovered from disasters, is accessible in case of legal challenge, scales/performs well, and can be

proactively managed. EMM provides all the facilities needed to turn “naked” messaging products—

such as Exchange and IM applications—into a complete, real-world solution.

A VISION FOR A COMPLETE MESSAGING SOLUTION

The EMM vision is of a solution that allows IT to build a truly integrated messaging fabric.

Such a fabric should reduce costs and provides a safe environment within which to innovate.

Thisgivesalevelofconfidencetoallowthebusinesstousemessagingtechnologiesforcompetitive

advantage, without excessive worry about how the “bad guys” will exploit them. This is the ultimate

sandbox, allowing innovative uses for messaging technology.

THE SYMANTEC ADVANTAGE

Much of the security market is moving towards this idea of an integrated strategy. What makes

Symantec special?

In our opinion, no vendor betters Symantec’s market-leading thinking in the area of integrated

messaging security. The following sections explain why.

In our opinion,

no vendor

betters Symantec’s

thinking in the

area of integrated

messaging security

17


EXECUTION—NOT JUST WORDS OR “BRANDING”

It’s one thing to talk about the desirability of an integrated approach, but quite another to do the

hard job of actually producing an integrated experience for customers. Over the last few years,

Symantec has been not merely talking about it but executing. And executing surprisingly quickly,

through strategic acquisitions and partnerships to bring best-of-breed technologies under one roof.

And the Symantec strategy isn’t simply to collect many technologies together into a confusing

morass of RFP checkboxes. It truly integrates them into a coherent, holistic solution.

MARKET LEADERSHIP

In our opinion, no other security vendor has the combination of scale, execution ability, and solu-

tion footprint to deliver this kind of integrated messaging security vision. These points are

all essential to realize the vision of truly integrated messaging security.

ScaleWe do not believe any competitor has greater scale than Symantec—both geographically and in

terms of the levels of technical resources that it can bring to bear to solve a customer’s problems.

ExecutionSymantec has clearly demonstrated its market leading ability to execute a product strategy,

producing a credible roadmap and delivering on those promises.

Analysts such as Gartner Group agree—Symantec is consistently ranked highly for its “ability to

execute” in Email Security magic quadrants.

FootprintWe do not believe any other messaging security vendor has broader coverage than Symantec.

This allows Symantec’s EMM product line to address the messaging security issues in just about

any environment.

We look to Symantec to continue to improve its product integration from a management

perspective. We want to see a tighter integration of policy throughout the product line, so a

centralized management console can “push” policy to all the control points in the infrastructure.

In our opinion,

no other security

vendor has the

combination of

scale, execution

ability, and solution

footprint to

deliver this inte-

grated messaging

security vision

18


VisionSymantec was an early leader in email security market consolidation. Whereas today this

consolidation is apparent to most people, it wasn’t always so. No other messaging security vendor

was quicker to take advantage of the coming market shifts as Symantec.

This allowed Symantec access to the cream of the technologies needed to be successful with an inte-

grated approach—for example, in anti spam, where highly-respected Opus1 tests for NetworkWorld

show Symantec’s technology to be superior to the vast majority of competing products.

So What?These capabilities are necessary, in order to offer options to the IT department. Integrated security

isn’taboutforcinga“onesizefitsall”solutiontoyourproblems.Asolutionshouldbetailoredfor

your requirements.

Conclusions

Buying trends are shifting, as organizations grasp the benefits of integrated approach to

emailsecuritypurchasing.ThesebenefitscanbesummedupintermsofTCO and ROI. Now is the

right time torealizethesebenefits.

SHIFTS IN BUYING TRENDS

We’ve seen that it was fashionable for IT departments to do their own integration of messaging

security products. It became a statement of faith that the best way to secure messaging infrastruc-

tures was to collect several point products together, in order to have best-of-breed solutions.

While this was a good idea a few years ago, this received wisdom is now a dangerous fallacy. The

Do-It-Yourself approach wastes time and money, without providing improved security.

Self-integration of point-products is no longer the best policy. It’s usually better to select an

integrated solution.

BENEFITS OF AN INTEGRATED APPROACH

Selecting an integrated solution reduces wasted IT effort, allows centralized management,

consolidates vendor relationships, and should permit a single support resource without the

finger-pointingthatcanoftenhappeninamulti-vendorenvironment.

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This allows IT staff to concentrate on the core task—managing the infrastructure—not managing

the integration. You can leave the messaging security technology to the experts.

A coherent, integrated solution takes advantage of technical synergies and allows you to enjoy

management synergies.

Italsohugelysimplifiestheprocessofaddingadditionalcapabilitiestoyoursecurityfabric;for

example, policy/regulatory compliance.

TCO SAVINGS, ROI BENEFITS

The bottom line is that an integrated approach should cost less. From a TCO perspective, the im-

provedefficienciesandconsolidatedvendorrelationshipswillinevitablyleadtosubstantial

cost savings.

Replacing a collection of point products with a comprehensive, integrated messaging security

solution should show a positive ROI.

RIGHT PLACE, RIGHT TIME

We’ve demonstrated that the time is right to seriously consider integrated messaging security

solutions. Which vendor is the best choice to provide such a solution? Such a vendor must have a

credible vision and strategy, be an expert in security and integration, and offer a broad range of

synergistic components.

Symantec’s Enterprise Message Management strategy allows IT to build a truly integrated

security fabric, encompassing all the key elements required to make a complete messaging security

solution. In our opinion:

• No vendor has made better strategic investments in the technologies required to be

best-of-breed in all areas.

• No vendor is better placed to capitalize on the technology it owns, integrating those

technologies into a true solution.

• No vendor does a better job of applying its talent to build messaging security solutions.

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For additional information on Symantec’s messaging security solutions please visit:

www.symantec.com/messagingsecurity

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