Symantec Introduces Brightmail Gateway 9.0

Symantec's latest version of Brightmail Gateway security platform includes features such as content encryption as well as increased scalability.

Security software specialist Symantec announced its latest messaging security platforms, Symantec Brightmail Gateway 9.0 and Symantec Brightmail Gateway 9.0 Small Business Edition. The company said the updated versions would deliver enhanced protection through real-time updates, provide greater control through integrated email encryption and offer increased scalability to meet the needs of both enterprises and small to medium-size businesses (SMBs). Brightmail Gateway 9.0 and Brightmail Gateway 9.0 Small Business Edition are scheduled to be available in Spring 2010.

Brightmail Gateway 9.0, which will also be a part of the company's Protection Suite Enterprise Edition, will introduce an advanced machine-learning module that leverages fuzzy intelligence to identify unique and targeted scams and phishing attacks, and protect against these low volume, yet high-cost threats. Jack Quinnell, director, product management for Symantec, claimed while many solutions claim to block more than 95 percent of spam, the targeted spam that does get through can do the significant damage due to advanced social engineering and criminal motivations behind these attacks. "The planned release of Symantec Brightmail Gateway 9.0 staves off these targeted attacks, blocking more than 99 percent of spam while helping protect sensitive information and streamlining management of mission-critical email security," he said.

Quinnell pointed to a recent survey conducted by Symantec, which showed that 42 percent of midmarket companies do not have effective email protection, and they become easy targets for cyber criminals to attack for financial gain. Brightmail Gateway 9.0 Small Business Edition, tailored for businesses with fewer than 250 users, may be installed within 15 minutes and provides the same enterprise class protection against viruses, spam, phishing, botnets, and spyware, and is made affordable by small-business-friendly licensing, he said.

Gateway 9.0 Small Business Edition, which will be available as both a physical appliance and a VMware-based virtual appliance, will offer increased ease of use with no requirements for manually tuning rulesets or maintaining allow and block lists to achieve effective antispam protection. Sean Adams, manager in charge of IT for industrial automation company Bertelkamp Automation, said the company has been blocking around 25,000 spam messages a day, and they haven't had any false positives. "The accuracy of Brightmail Gateway Small Business Edition is unbelievable," he said. "And, with the outbound message filtering, I finally have control over the content that leaves our organization -- from now on, email around here is going to be like Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood- safe and harmless."

Brightmail Gateway 9.0 is expected to provide real-time protection with antispam rule updates occurring as frequently as every second. The company said these updates would leverage the depth and breadth of the Symantec Global Intelligence Network, which includes more than 120 million antivirus sensors, 40,000 firewall and intrusion detection sensors, and feedback gleaned from more than 800 million mailboxes protected by Symantec. In addition, a new premium add-on service to Brightmail Gateway 9.0, Content Encryption, is scheduled to be integrated with Brightmail Gateway's advanced content filtering and data loss prevention policies and workflow.