Trend Micro Updates Endpoint, Web Gateway Products

Trend Micro updated its suite of antivirus and Web security products with new capabilities to protect users from fake antivirus and scams on social networking sites.

The new Titanium 2012 builds upon the security overhaul the company did for the security suite in 2010 by adding two new scanning engines to detect fake antivirus programs and botnets, Trend Micro said Aug. 22. The updated suite is based on the Trend Micro Smart Protection Network cloud service.

The online threat landscape is changing as security threats become more pervasive and malicious, said Carol Carpenter, executive general manager at Trend Micro. Trend Micro sees as many as 300,000 threats in a single day, according to Carpenter.

"Cyber-criminals are becoming more sophisticated," Carpenter said, noting that they are attacking users "where they feel safe, such as on their mobile devices or talking to their friends on social networking sites."

Titanium 2012 is designed to protect users regardless of where they are browsing or what device they are using, Carpenter said. For example, the comprehensive suite Titanium Maximum Security includes a new scanner that automatically checks user profiles on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter to identify potentially unsafe and malicious links. Maximum Security also protects smartphones and tablets with antivirus features in Trend Micro Mobile Security and file and folder backup and synchronization capabilities in Trend Micro SafeSync.

All versions of Titanium 2012 include Trend Micro Smart Surfing for Mac, which supports the latest Mac OS X operating system, code-named "Lion." Mobile security is available as an add-on in the most comprehensive suite, Titanium Maximum Security.

In addition, the updated software can detect and eliminate fake antivirus software and scareware tools as well as scan the system for any botnet activity and infection. A new scanning method that relies on a behavioral monitoring engine can also identify malware that had been specially encrypted by "packer" technology to evade detection by antivirus tools. The malware is unpacked when it executes, which causes the behavioral engine to send a trigger to have Titanium scan the unpacked file to find out if it is malicious.

Trend Micro Titanium Maximum Security retails for $79.95, Titanium Internet Security retails for $69.95, and Titanium AntiVirus Plus retails for $39.95.

The company also updated Trend Micro InterScan Web Security 5.5, the Web gateway product that protects cloud-based applications. InterScan Web Security supports bare-metal, VMware Ready and Microsoft Hyper-V virtual appliances, the company said.

As more companies use cloud-based applications such as instant messaging, peer-to-peer, video and audio applications as well as Web mail, administrators can use InterScan Web Security to block unwanted or unsafe content at the network perimeter. InterScan Web Security allows administrators to identify and filter Web traffic that may be dangerous or against corporate policy and even capture sample traffic and create custom filters to enforce any policy necessary.

Cloud-based Web 2.0 applications expose organizations to "cyber-criminals attempting to gain access to sensitive data," said John Maddison, general manager of data center security at Trend Micro. Like Titanium, InterScan is also powered by the Trend Micro Smart Protection Network cloud service.