|
Check Point Software Technologies Ltd.
- Security Software - Category Directory
+972-3-753-4555
3A
Jabotinsky Street
Ramat-Gan 52520, Israel
www.checkpoint.com
Sales
$433
million
Business Description
Check Point develops markets and supports Internet security and VPN
solutions for enterprise and high-end networks, service providers, small and
medium businesses, and consumers. The Company delivers solutions that enable
secure, reliable and manageable communications over Internet Protocol (IP)
networks including the Internet, intranets and extranets. The technology of
Check Point is aimed to provide enterprises with intelligent security
solutions for their most critical information security challenges in three
distinct areas: perimeter, Web and internal networks. The capabilities of
Check Point products can be extended with the Open Platform for Security (OPSEC),
enabling integration with leading hardware appliances and third-party
security software applications.
In March 2004, the Company completed the acquisition of privately held Zone
Labs for approximately $114 million in cash and 5.3 million ordinary shares.
The Company also assumed Zone Labs’ outstanding employee stock options which
could convert to approximately 2.8 million Check Point shares.
Zone Labs is a provider of endpoint security solutions for enterprises,
small businesses and consumers. Zone Labs’ product offerings include Zone
Labs Integrity security platform for the enterprise market, ZoneAlarm and
ZoneAlarm Pro desktop security software mainly to consumers and small
businesses, and the IMsecure product line, its instant messaging (IM)
security solutions for enterprises, small businesses and consumers.
Check
Point’s Products
Check Point products are packaged in different ways and address various
customer needs and deployment scenarios. Most products run on a broad range
of hardware platforms, running primarily on the following operating systems:
Nokia IPSO, Microsoft (Windows), Sun Microsystems (Solaris) and Linux. Check
Point offers a broad and integrated range of policy-based solutions for
perimeter, internal and Web security:
Perimeter Security
Perimeter solutions are used to control the access between the customer
internal network or computers and external network such as the internet.
Check Point historically focused on VPN and firewalls which are the main
building blocks for perimeter security. In June 2003, the Company introduced
a new version of its flagship product named NG with Application Intelligence
which integrates both network and application-level capabilities to deliver
comprehensive attack protection and network security. The following products
are marketed primarily as perimeter security products:
Enterprise products:
VPN-1 Pro
Check Point VPN-1 Pro family of products integrates access control,
authentication, and encryption to guarantee the security of network
connections, the authenticity of local and remote users, and the privacy and
integrity of data communications. It also includes FireWall-1 for effective
security and efficient administration, using Check Point’s Stateful
Inspection and Application Intelligence technologies. VPN-1 Pro is offered
in multiple packages, depending on the size of the network protected, some
packages include the SmartCenter/SmartCenter Pro management software and
some include only the security gateway software.
VPN-1 SecureClient & VPN-1 SecureRemote
VPN-1 SecureClient and VPN-1 SecureRemote are VPN endpoints which provide
secure connectivity from laptops and other mobile devices, work seamlessly
with Check Point’s VPN-1 products and enable the set up of secure remote
access as part of an overall security policy, including access control, user
authentication and logging. VPN-1 SecuRemote licenses are included with
VPN-1 gateway products at no cost.
VPN-1 SecureClient also includes personal firewall capabilities, secure
configuration verification and streamlined software distribution and
management and is licensed by the number of users.
VPN-1 Edge
VPN-1 Edge appliances provide secure connectivity for remote sites such as
branch and retail sites. Integrating VPN-1/FireWall-1 technology, high
availability and networking features, VPN-1 Edge appliances are managed
centrally through SMART management, enabling the efficient setup of
thousands of gateways.
Security Management Solutions - SMART
Check Point’s management solutions using SMART technology enable
organizations of different sizes to define, deploy and enforce security
policies consistently across multiple enforcement points. SMART Solutions
for enterprises include the following product offerings:
SmartCenter
SmartCenter is Check Point’s comprehensive management product, comprised of
an intuitive “Dashboard” that enables administrators to centrally define the
VPN, firewall and QoS policies of a network, and a management server that
stores and distributes these different elements of the security policy. This
product provides administrators with enhanced understanding of distributed
security deployments, and is combined with automatic policy distribution to
deliver greater control, improved security and enhanced ease of use. It also
includes the elements to collect, record and manage the network and security
events as well as the SmartView Tracker to view and analyze those events.
SmartView Family
The SmartView product family includes the SmartView Tracker for viewing,
searching and analyzing of network and security events recorded by the
Company’s products. SmartView Monitor enables real-time viewing of network
and security traffic graphs by various criteria. SmartView Reporter enables
the automatic creation of high-level reports demonstrating the network and
security operations.
SmartCenter Pro
SmartCenter Pro is an extension of our SmartCenter management products that
bundles an additional set of management tools to provide a unique enterprise
security management product. Included in SmartCenter Pro is the SmartLSM
large scale management tool, SmartUpdate for distributed software version
management and updates, SmartMap topological network view, Management Server
High Availability, SmartDirectory for integration with LDAP directories and
the SmartView Monitor for graphical reporting and analysis.
Products for medium businesses, small businesses and consumers:
Check Point Express
Check Point Express is a perimeter security product designed for mid-sized
companies with up to 500 employees and multiple sites. It provides access
control, network and application level protection, remote access and
site-to-site VPN capabilities, along with an intuitive SMART management
interface.
Safe@Office
Check Point’s Safe@Office product line is based on the Stateful Inspection
technology found in VPN-1, and delivers VPN and firewall capabilities to
small businesses, consumers, and the Managed Service Providers (MSPs).
Safe@Office products can be managed individually using a web browser and can
be provided with centralized management service via an MSP using the
Security Management Portal (SMP.)
The recent acquisition of Zone Labs contributed the following product lines
to the small business and consumers perimeter product offerings:
ZoneAlarm Pro
ZoneAlarm Pro is designed to protect Internet-connected PCs at homes and
small businesses with strong security, ease of use and online privacy
protection. ZoneAlarm Pro includes ad blocking and cookie control
capabilities as well as simple set-up for networks, including wireless
networks. It also includes features which reduce the risk of online fraud
and identity theft by guarding against the theft of personally-identifiable
information, intellectual property and other confidential data.
ZoneAlarm
ZoneAlarm is designed to provide basic Internet security, ideal for the home
PC. ZoneAlarm is free for personal and non-profit use.
IMsecure Pro
IMsecure Pro is a consumer instant messaging security product for any
program that accesses IM services such as AOL Instant Messenger, MSN
Messenger and Yahoo! Messenger. IMsecure Pro is designed to maintain the
privacy and security of IM conversations protect PCs and personal
information from spammers and identity thieves, hackers and predators who
exploit vulnerable IM connections. IMsecure Pro protects the PC
transparently, regardless of service or client used, requiring no change to
existing habits or software. Inbound and Outbound Threat Protection reduces
exposure to malware and prevents eavesdropping, impersonation, and theft of
personally-identifiable information, intellectual property and other
confidential data stored on the PC.
IMsecure
IMsecure is free for personal and non-profit use, offers basic inbound
threat protection from buffer overflow attacks as well as Message Encryption
for one IM account to protect instant messages from being monitored.
Products for service providers, data centers and large enterprises:
VPN-1/FireWall-1 VSX
VPN-1®/FireWall-1® VSX is a high-speed, multi-policy security product
designed for VLAN-enabled corporate networks, data centers and service
provider POPs. It uses the same, patented Stateful Inspection technology
used in the VPN-1 Pro. By aggregating up to 250 individual security domains
on a single platform, VPN-1/ FireWall-1 VSX minimizes hardware investment.
VPN-1/FireWall-1 VSX can be run on multiple gigabit platforms to deliver the
required performance in high-bandwidth environments. It is managed using
Check Point’s SmartCenter products and Provider-1, delivering a unified
management architecture that service providers and enterprises can also use
to manage all their other Check Point enforcement points centrally.
Provider-1
Provider-1 is a security management product designed to meet the unique
challenges of service providers and large enterprises and is available in
two editions designated for these two segments. Provider-1 consolidates
customer security policies into a centralized policy management architecture
that scales to support thousands of customers while minimizing investment in
hardware and labor. For large enterprises, Provider-1 simplifies a complex
security policy by segmenting it into more manageable sub-policies to match
geographic, functional, or other logical groupings.
Security Management Portal
The Security Management Portal (SMP) is a management product for service
providers, which delivers outsourced Internet security to small businesses.
Developed by SofaWare Technologies Ltd., a company affiliated to Check
Point, the SMP enables service providers to create flexible service
categories and to centrally manage tens of thousands of subscribers.
Product for wireless carriers:
FireWall-1 GX
FireWall-1 GX provides security to GPRS- (2.5G) and UMTS- (3G) enabled
wireless networks. FireWall-1 GX is designed to protect these wireless
infrastructures from the threats of untrusted networks. With FireWall-1 GX,
wireless network operators can offer seamless roaming to their data
customers without exposing their network to potential security threats.
Internal Security
Historically, IT security organizations have focused on protecting the
perimeter of their networks. However, many of today’s security threats are
introduced within the boundaries of the corporate internal network.
Check Point InterSpect
Check Point InterSpect products were introduced in January 2004. They are
sold as a Check Point appliance including the hardware and software.
InterSpect internal security gateways segment internal network into multiple
“security zones”, controlling traffic flow between those zones. InterSpect
blocks the spread of certain attacks and worms, isolates computers that
generate suspicious activity from communicating with other network segments
and can also allow only certain types of traffic to different security
zones.
The recent acquisition of Zone Labs contributed the following product line
to the Company’s Internal Security product offerings:
Zone Labs Integrity
Zone Labs Integrity products are designed to enable enterprises to enforce
and control security policy on desktops across the organization from a
centralized management console, regardless of whether users are accessing
the network remotely or from inside the enterprise network. Zone Labs
Integrity reduces exposures to vulnerabilities by protecting individual
endpoints and thus enabling deeper level of security enforcement.
Web Security
Companies are increasingly dependent on Web and Internet systems to run
their businesses. As usage and dependence of Web-based systems increases,
companies are focusing on specialized protection for Web servers and
applications, and have a concentrated need to provide secure, unified access
to these systems.
User Authority
Check Point’s UserAuthority provides centralized administration and
distributed enforcement of authorization access policies for Web
applications, Check Point UserAuthority centralizes the administration and
enforcement of user authentication in enterprise networks, uniformly
implementing best-of-breed authentication products (PKI, tokens, LDAP, etc.)
across enterprise networks.
Check Point intends to expand its web based security solutions and launch
new web security technologies and products in 2004.
Technology
Check Point network security solutions include various technologies that
enable our customers to define their network security policies, enforce
these policies across their networks, collect information and monitor the
security and traffic flow and analyze and update those configurations to
reflect changes in the network and in the security policies. The Company’s
products are packaged and marketed under different names and address
security tasks in various environments and a variety of price points.
Stateful Inspection Technology
Check Point’s VPN-1 product offerings are based upon Stateful Inspection
technology that enables the screening of all communications attempting to
pass through a gateway in a secure but efficient manner. By extracting and
maintaining extensive “state information” from all relevant communication
layers, the system can verify data for full compliance with the security and
traffic policy and make intelligent security and traffic prioritization
decisions. By extracting and analyzing data in place without making a copy,
Stateful Inspection results in virtually no performance degradation,
enabling VPN-1 product offerings to scale effectively with increasing
network bandwidth. In addition, Check Point’s proprietary implementation of
Stateful Inspection in a “virtual machine” design provides in-place
upgradeability and is designed to enable the Company’s products to be easily
ported to a wide range of platforms. Furthermore, because Check Point’s
products reside at network access points, which are the critical convergence
points for network security and traffic management, the Company is able to
apply this same architectural foundation and inspect traffic only once for
both critical network decisions and traffic management, resulting in
increased network performance.
Security and Network Traffic Enforcement Technologies (based on Stateful
Inspection)
Check Point VPN-1 enforcement points are typically installed at the network
perimeter (as security gateways), deployed on critical servers and installed
on client platforms (with VPN-1 SecureClient). These enforcement points
implement the company’s patented Stateful Inspection technology using the
INSPECT engine. The INSPECT engine scans all incoming and outgoing IP
traffic and is based on the Company’s patented Stateful Inspection
technology, which matches all traffic against the security policy. The
INSPECT engine can be enhanced by the Company, its partners, or users by
using the INSPECT programming language.
Based on fine-grained matching, network traffic can be dropped (indicating a
violation of the security policy), encrypted and forwarded (secured VPN
traffic), prioritized (FloodGate-1 QoS) or sent for further analysis through
additional enforcement modules. Additional enforcement modules perform
functions such as checking the credentials and authentication of requesting
users or inspecting traffic through screening technology such as URL
filtering or an Anti-Virus system. Many of these additional security
technologies are provided by third party vendors and are integrated through
the OPSEC architecture. In addition, technologies like Check Point’s
SecureXL further accelerate the performance of security and network
operations using system extensions or third party ASIC-based accelerators
and platforms.
Application Intelligence
Check Point’s Application Intelligence is a set of advanced capabilities,
integrated into VPN-1, Check Point InterSpect and SmartDefense product
offerings, which detect and prevent application-level attacks. Some of the
most serious threats in today’s Internet environment come from attacks that
attempt to exploit application vulnerabilities. Since application-level
attacks tend to be sophisticated in nature, effective defenses must be
equally sophisticated and intelligent.
Security Management Architecture (SMART)
Check Point’s products are based on its SMART architecture, which allows
configuration and management of security policies from a single, centralized
administrative workstation. Security policies can be defined and deployed
for a single security gateway protecting a small business, for multiple
gateways in an enterprise network environment, or for multiple security
domains allowing a service provider to deliver security to a large number of
customers, or subscribers. An object-oriented architecture allows for the
efficient storage and specification of security policy elements (such as
computers, users, networks and network devices, network services and
security rules). Powerful management tools, such as object managers, audit
and network activity logs, monitoring tools and policy editors are based on
this unifying architecture. The Company’s products contain extensive
monitoring and reporting capabilities designed to improve the manageability
of the system.
SecurePlatform
SecurePlatform enables easy deployment of the Company’s products on a
variety of open systems. SecurePlatform bundles certain Company’s products
with a hardened and optimized version of the Linux operating system, with a
set of tools in order to ease the setup and network configuration.
SecurePlatform allows improved cost/performance and reduced total cost of
ownership for security open servers.
SecureXL
Check Point’s SecureXL™ is a software interface that enables Check Point to
leverage technologies from multiple silicon, appliance and computer system
partners to accelerate the performance of firewall and VPN gateways by
off-loading simple, though computationally intensive functions to
third-party packet processors. Using SecureXL different hardware appliance
vendors can stimulate the performance of “Secured by Check Point” appliances
and provide greater value to their customers that are benefiting from
wire-speed advanced security.
Open Platform for Security (OPSEC)
The OPSEC architecture provides a single platform that manages various
aspects of network security through an open, extensible management
framework. Various third-party security applications plug into the OPSEC
framework through published application programming interfaces (APIs), such
as the CVP (Content Vectoring Protocol) which integrates virus scanning
software and other content inspection programs, UFP (URL Filtering Protocol)
which integrates URL list services, and SAMP (Suspicious Activity Monitoring
Protocol) which integrates suspicious activity monitoring programs. OPSEC
also supports industry-standard protocols such as RADIUS, IPSec, and SNMP.
Once integrated into the OPSEC framework, all applications can be set-up and
managed from a central point, utilizing a single policy editor.
SmartDefense
Check Point SmartDefense is an Active Defense solution which utilizes
Stateful Inspection and Application Intelligence technologies to actively
protect organizations against network and application level attacks by using
intelligent security technology, which blocks attacks by type and class.
SmartDefense provides a centralized console for real-time information on
attacks, as well as attack detection, blocking, logging, auditing and
alerting. Check Point is offering a real time update subscription service to
SmartDefense users, allowing security administrators to mitigate new
vulnerabilities in a simple and convenient way. Check Point provides up to
date security for its customers using SmartDefense Updates service, a
supplementary service based on SmartDefense capabilities, which provides
both advisories and additional attack mitigation capabilities.
The main technologies used by recently acquired Zone Labs include the
following:
Cooperative Enforcement
The Zone Labs Cooperative Enforcement technology enables to integrate with
network gateway products - from VPNs to switches to wireless access points -
in order to ensure that every endpoint is compliant with security policy
before it is allowed access to network resources.
TrueVector Technology
TrueVector Technology is flexible and efficient software platform for
enabling high-performance, scalable and robust Internet security technology.
TrueVector, the basis for Zone Labs’ entire consumer and enterprise product
lines, makes it much easier for Zone Labs and their partners to secure
Internet access.
Industry Background
Information, and the ability to access and distribute it, is a key strategic
asset in today’s competitive business environment. This need to effectively
use and communicate information as well as work more collaboratively has led
to the extensive deployment of network-based communications systems
(connectivity). Increased connectivity is in turn increasing the need for
technology to safeguard and manage the access to information available over
these increasingly global networks.
Increase in Connectivity
The network computing market has undergone three major transitions over the
past decade, which has contributed to the increase in global connectivity.
The first of these transitions was the migration of corporate computing
environments from centralized mainframe systems to distributed client/server
environments. The ability to access and share information through
client/server technology has expanded the need for connectivity beyond
workgroup LANs (Local Area Networks) to enterprise-wide networks spanning
multiple LANs and WANs (Wide Area Networks). The second major transition has
been the widespread adoption of the Internet for business-to-business
communications. Internet-based business applications have rapidly expanded
beyond e-mail to a broad range of business applications and services
including electronic publishing, direct to customer transactions, product
marketing, advertising and customer support. The emergence of increased
reliance on the Internet for business communications and transactions
increases the need for and associated challenges in providing secure access
to information and applications. Finally, companies of all sizes in most
industries are embracing and supporting increased connectivity for mobile
and remote employees. This includes connectivity to corporate data and
application resources, as well as general Internet access. Remote users are
increasingly able to receive more and better information from a growing
spectrum of devices, including laptops, personal digital assistants, and
cell phones. The expansion of network access to mobile workers is driving
demand to secure all devices with Internet access, as well as those
connecting to the corporate network. These transitions and the need for
secure, managed communications, have led to the broad acceptance of virtual
private networks through the use of the public Internet infrastructure and
associated protocols and applications, sharing information and utilizing
services both within the enterprise and with business partners and customers
are now widely adopted. As a result, businesses are able to share internal
information and to run enterprise applications across geographically
dispersed facilities as well as enable customers, suppliers and other
business partners to inexpensively link into their enterprise information
systems. As Internet protocols and infrastructure gain increasingly
widespread acceptance for global communication, new wide-area connectivity
services continue to emerge at a rapid rate, such as database access,
transaction-processing services, voice over IP services and video
teleconferencing services. This expansion of services and applications is
further accelerating the use of networks as global communication systems.
The Need for Security
The growth of Internet connectivity among organizations of all sizes has
increased the risk that corporate Information Technology (IT) resources can
be attacked via the Internet. Firms have recognized this risk and are
deploying security solutions in an effort to protect company confidential
information from unauthorized access. The primary means of controlling
access to corporate networks and protecting against attacks is the
deployment of Internet firewalls. Firewalls are typically deployed at the
demarcation of the corporate LAN and the Internet, and are used to strictly
control traffic into and out of the company’s network. Firewall technology
is currently undergoing an evolution, enabling it to detect and defeat
highly sophisticated network and application-level attacks that are
increasingly prevalent on the Internet today.
In addition to protecting corporate IT assets from attack, corporations take
steps to guard sensitive company information traversing untrusted networks,
such as the Internet. Securing company information on the Internet is
critical as more organizations are utilizing the Internet as their corporate
network backbone to link company offices and employees. Putting sensitive
information on the Internet without adequate security exposes confidential
data to the public. To mitigate this risk, increasing number of firms is
deploying VPNs to encrypt and authenticate their Internet-bound traffic.
Leveraging standards-based VPN technology enables organizations to connect
offices and remote employees via the Internet, while maintaining the privacy
and integrity of communications.
IT security administrators within corporations have long focused on securing
the network perimeter. With the rise of costly worms and other attacks
introduced from within the internal network through mobile and wireless
devices, organizations have realized the importance of securing their
internal networks. But while many of the same principles used to construct
and operate perimeter security solutions also apply to internal networks,
internal networks are much more complex and have unique security
requirements.
Frequently, firewalls and VPNs are deployed together on the same platform.
Integrating firewall and VPN functionality delivers greater security for all
traffic and eases the management burden on security and network
administrators.
Security Software Companies in the Directory
Check Point Software
Technologies
Computer Associates
Cyberguard
Internet Security Systems
McAfee
NetIQ
Secure Computing
Symantec
Trend
Micro
|
|
