"Websense, a leader in the Web filtering space, has earned the reputation as a security company over the last couple of years. We provide integrated web, messaging and data security," says Geoff Haggart, senior vice president, EMEA/APAC, Websense. "Data leakage and data prevention is a new area of focus for Websense. We see a lot of revenue coming in from this and there is a clear opportunity for us in this space."

He says, "We are seeing an increasing amount of synergy between e-mail and Web, which is only going to increase further. Our focus is more on data security - to prevent any accidental or deliberate kind of leakage."

Websense EIP strategy
Websense's Enterprise Information Protection (EIP) caters to Web security, e-mail security and data security. "EIP is about keeping the bad stuff, spam, Trojan and malware, out from emails or Website. It is about protecting the good stuff, business from going out and avoiding the bad stuff from coming in," says Haggart.

"The traditional way of doing things has to change and you have to be much more real time. You have to have the capability of real Web security protection and stop information from being accidentally or deliberately leaked," he adds. "It is about how well you automate the business process."

Adding on to Haggart's comments., Manish Bansal, regional marketing manager, SAARC, Websense, says: "Websense's EIP is different in the sense that we look into who, what, where and how of it; taking into consideration the e-mail and Web security. Many companies who have DLPs and Web security work in silos. Companies are concerned about the kind of information that will be hosted on their sites. They have a huge concern on the kind of stuff that enters by way of chat room and social networking sites. In such cases, the reputation of the company gets affected. This is where we come in to protect their data."

Elaborating on what the EIP does, Bansal says: "The EIP takes care of inside-out, on- how to can control those leakages. It also has the intelligence of sending right information to the right person."

Threats and security in Web 2.0 world
Generally, most companies do not realise the exposure they have in Web 2.0, on every piece of malicious information that gets into the system. In terms of malware or data loss, they are not aware of the exposures that they are not covered against," says Haggart. "It is better that they are actually covered than they really are. Awareness and understanding of new-age security threats, especially in the Web 2.0 world is a must," he adds.

"When you are using the Web, you normally don't know whether it is a good site or a bad site. You are not sure of what it is," he notes. When you click on certain mails, it takes you to bad sites with malicious codes and that would steal all the essential information from your systems in a short span of time. "Some of the attacks are very clever, and that's one of the problems we face in Web 2.0," says Haggart.

"Websense provides multiple levels of protection against such attacks. This is where we have built such expertise to look for such malwares, spams, links to bad sites with malicious codes," says Haggart, adding, "We can actually watch them, identify them and block them. Even if the email gets through to you, you will not make it to the link it points you to and never get into such bad sites."

"With Web 2.0 becoming a mass acceptance, awareness on Web security is also increasing by the day. It does not start from organizations but from individuals. Organizations are realizing that they cannot stop their employees from using Web 2.0 or social networking sites," adds Bansal.

Web has become an extended organization
"Enterprises are realising the power of Web 2.0. The acceptance of tools like social networking is so huge that they can utilize it for any purpose. This is driving the Web 2.0 need," says Bansal.

For example, companies in the services sector and in the FMCG areas are using blogs and social networking sites to do social marketing. This is an innovative way of promoting their products. The whole business is put on the Web. "Web has actually become an extended organization for these companies and this is where Web 2.0 become critical," he adds.

India market
India has been a good success story for Websense. According to Haggart, Websense has seen a good growth in India in the last couple of years, with a solid customer base. "India is one of the top growth countries. We have a great market penetration in terms of Web security and Web filtering. There is good reputation for Websense's products and we want to continue to invest in India," says Haggart.

Websense is also holding road shows in the country to reach out to more and more customers.