Patch mgt on the Cloud

BLUE BELL, US: Fiberlink Communications Corporation, the provider of cloud-based Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) solutions, today announced the MaaS360 Patch Management from the Cloud Service.

In today’s IT world, devices are mobile and the Internet has become the corporate network. The result is additional challenges for IT Managers to keep devices patched and protected. Fiberlink’s Patch Management from the Cloud Service enables IT to successfully manage and deploy security patches to all computers, including mobile computing devices connected to external wireless networks outside the enterprise. The service maintains vigilant control over patches to protect against data breaches without increasing help desk costs or compromising employee productivity.

IT managers know that all systems should have up-to-date security software and patches. In reality, inadequate patch management leaves many organizations vulnerable to infection via malware and other security breaches. Moreover, some enterprise IT policies only focus on operating system patches, overlooking popular software like Java or QuickTime. According to a survey by the Ponemon Institute, the cost of a data breach increased to $6.75 million in 2009. Another source, the Quant Patch Management Survey, found that 50% of enterprises do not have a formal patch management process, 54 per cent do not measure compliance with patch management policies and 68% do not track patch time-to-deployment.

"Prior to MaaS360 we had to use four different consoles to check the AV, firewall and patch compliance of our corporate and remote users,” said Bill Dawson, Technical Services Manager, Mizuno USA, Inc. “The MaaS360 portal brings all that data together so we can quickly assess our compliance level and zoom in on problem areas with the drill-down function. For the first time in my memory we don't have to jump through hoops to track our software. Thanks, Fiberlink."

“More than ever, patch management is a critical part of IT operations. Enterprises cannot just rely on Microsoft’s monthly patch updates for their entire patch maintenance strategy,” said John Nielsen, Product Manager at Fiberlink. “The MaaS360 Patch Management from the Cloud Service provides centralized deployment and reporting and covers not only Microsoft patches, but common applications from vendors such as Adobe, Sun and Apple. It ensures that patches have been successfully installed, preventing false positive results and maintaining tight security on all computers, both on and off the corporate LAN.”