BC through integrated network security

Today's attacks on networks are more disruptive and expensive than ever, threatening productivity, customer service, and business continuity. Integrated network security systems that defend against these attacks are fundamental to maintaining both business operations and reputations.

An end-to-end approach of intelligent networking is critical to today's security environment. In the past, administrators focused on preventing threats from entering the network perimeter. Today, many threats come from inside the network.

Whether the threat is external or internal, every network device (from laptops to the most powerful routers) now represents a potential point of entry. Thus, the best place to apply security policies and control all these points is the network fabric itself.

As the network touches all facets of your business, integrated security features help your IT personnel eliminate duplicate resources, automate essential functions, and consolidate efforts. The result is efficient, network wide protection with an added bonus: The same security features that keep threats out can also securely open selected portions of your network to customers, vendors, and partners.

Is your network safe?

People who threaten your network are constantly developing new ways to take advantage of gaps between security products and the weaknesses in individual devices. In addition to PCs and servers, administrators must secure devices including point-of-sale (PoS) terminals, physical alarm systems, and even building-control systems. Given the wide diversity of targets and high volume of attacks common today, addressing each threat individually is impractical.

An infrastructure that incorporates intelligent networking helps networks react to known attacks and adapt to new ones. The answer is to make security systems aware of network wide activity so that they can produce a coordinated response based on business priorities.

Intelligent networking and security

Intelligent networking uses a systemic approach that integrates intelligence into switches, routers and end-points across the infrastructure. Flexible policy controls adapt this intelligent system to your business processes so that the system can protect application and service delivery. Any change in policy, whether it reflects security, management, or communication needs, is implemented automatically throughout the network. The result: networks are more resilient, integrated, and adaptive, and increase your infrastructure's total value of ownership.

Other advantages of network-based security include:

• Cost savings: Capitalizes on investments by extending the functionality of existing and new threat defense mechanisms.
•  Agility: Changes to security policies can be implemented in one place and quickly distributed throughout a global enterprise, providing automatic, immediate, network wide protection.
• Integration: Security applications can take full advantage of the intelligent networking features in devices, network software, and infrastructure hardware.
• Automation: The network automatically takes security action according to policies created by administrators, resulting in faster response with less administrator overhead.
• Helping to ensure protection from internal, external, malicious, or accidental threats also enhances productivity by helping to enable secure collaboration.  for example:
  
  · Customers and other visitors can bring their own laptops into your facility and access the Internet without fear of compromising your network or theirs.
  
  · Vendors and partners can connect to your enterprise network and access only data appropriate for them.
  
  · Employees can connect to the network either from home or on the road with confidence that they are not introducing viruses.

Enhanced collaboration between internal groups as well as up and down the supply chain and across interorganizational business functions enables more efficient business processes that can lead to increased profits.

Intelligent networking magnifies the value of traditional security products by providing integrated, cohesive organization wide security. Although individual solutions can deflect some threats, network-level systems integration provides a more powerful, comprehensive, and proactive approach that adapts readily to new threats. This agility is critical to safeguarding data and helping to ensure business continuity.

The Author is the Business Development Manager, Advanced Technologies, Cisco India & SAARC