PatchLink Expands End-point Security Offering Through Support of the Network Admission Control (NAC) Program

PatchLink Corporation (www.patchlink.com) today announced its support for the Network Admission Control (NAC) industry effort, which will enhance the Company's end-point security patch and vulnerability management solution with critical network admission control capabilities.

The combination of NAC and PatchLink technologies provides:

• An extensible standards-based solution that gives organizations the ability to "scan and block" or "quarantine" unsecured computers from accessing secured, heterogeneous enterprise networks.
• Automatic policy-based remediation services for blocked computers that have been denied network admission as a result of interoperability between the Cisco Trust Agent and PatchLink's award-winning PATCHLINK UPDATE. This cooperative automation ensures that blocked computers are quickly and cost effectively made compliant with security policies before being granted entry into a secured network.
• An automated system for conflict-free updating of other security and productivity components for all common operating system environments and applications, such as anti-virus definitions, firewall configurations, and baseline application sets.

"As the established leader in security patch and vulnerability management, PatchLink is excited to collaborate in a technology leadership effort like NAC to bring improved end-point security technology to organizations worldwide," said PatchLink CEO Sean Moshir. "In 2005, customers trying to achieve a 360-degree IT security posture will inevitably confront and have to deal with the issue of how to detect, quarantine, and remediate systems connecting to their core network."

The NAC program is an industry effort led by Cisco Systems that uses the network infrastructure to enforce security policy compliance on all devices seeking access to network computing resources, thereby limiting damage from viruses, worms and other network-based threats. Using NAC, organizations can manage network access for end-point devices such as PCs, PDAs, and servers, verifying their full compliancy with established security policy.

"PatchLink's involvement brings valuable patch and vulnerability management capabilities to the NAC program," said Russell Rice, director of product marketing in Cisco's Security Technology Group. "Industry collaboration is a key cornerstone of the program and we are pleased to have PatchLink join NAC."

"Gartner is currently recommending that customers invest in automated scan-and-block initiatives as they mature in 2005," said Gartner Analyst Mark Nicolett. "A Network Access Control implementation should leverage a company's general-purpose security configuration management, identification and access management, and remediation policies and technologies."

Already working to advance the end-point security technology cause across a variety of operating systems and security layers, Moshir notes, "Network Admission Control is a vital security initiative and critical to any corporate or public sector organization battling to keep its distributed network protected from the viruses, Trojans, and malicious worms that so easily infect networks through remote, mobile and transient network connections. We are encouraged by Cisco's efforts that will bring ultimate benefit to our enterprise customers."

PatchLink's integration with NAC is expected for delivery in the first calendar quarter of 2005.

About PatckLink

PatchLink®, a global leader in vulnerability management solutions, provides the industry's first comprehensive security platform for unified protection and control of all enterprise servers and endpoints. More than 5,000 organizations around the globe use PatchLink's positive security model solutions to integrate management and administration, consolidate infrastructure, enforce enterprise-level policies, lower cost of ownership and reduce risk. PatchLink is headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona and was founded in 1991 by Sean Moshir.