Bull and Amdahl announce end-to-end security solution for Internet business; Bull, Amdahl to market Bull's new ISM/AccessMaster Internet management capabilities for securing public, private networks throughout the global open enterprise

Business Wire, Sept 18, 1996

ATLANTA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 18, 1996--Bull Net Interop Booth #2212--In a move that promises to bring electronic commerce and other Internet-based applications a giant step closer to practical reality, Bull and Amdahl Corporation announced at NetWorld Interop opening here today that they will jointly market extensions to Bull's ISM/AccessMaster security management software, including new capabilities that provide end-to-end enterprise-wide network, system and security management to the Internet.

The new enhancements, AccessMaster Release 2.2, extend centralized security and management services to firewalls and other public network devices, such as remote access servers. These allow companies to open their secured private networks to the unsecured Internet by offering an end-to-end security solution. The new capabilities will allow organizations to secure such applications as:

- Business transactions, such as electronic commerce, electronic payment - Community exchanges, such as bulletin boards, electronic mail, Web access and chat groups - Telecommunications by telecommuters and nomadic, mobile workers - Communications over low-cost public networks.

"Today's corporate Intranets are becoming synonymous with traditional enterprise networks, yet they lack critical security management safeguards," said Michael Carabetta, Amdahl vice president and general manager, A Software Group. "Bull's AccessMaster enhancements allow Amdahl to offer its customers centralized security management that permits secured access to and from all corporate resources -- legacy systems, distributed servers, PCs and remote access devices -- even via the Internet. This newest security enhancement to the comprehensive Amdahl A Application Management Suite represents a major opportunity for Amdahl customers to expand their applications beyond the corporate walls into the low cost public network."

Amdahl will offer the new version of AccessMaster as part of its A Application Management Suite, providing valuable enterprise management solutions and services for deploying applications in multi-tiered, heterogeneous computing environments. Amdahl is an OEM for selected Bull software products.

"AccessMaster is unique in the industry because it integrates Internet security within a comprehensive network, system and security enterprise management environment, ISM/OpenMaster in our case," said Claude Derue, director of worldwide product marketing for Bull's ISM business unit in Paris. "By providing a single security user management model covering all components of the network, including firewalls, AccessMaster Release 2.2 allows the administrator to manage the security of all components from a single application. This effectively brings Internet services, such as a Web or FTP server, under a global, enterprise security policy."

With AccessMaster, administrators experience substantial increases in efficiency and productivity while boosting overall security through a single, coherent view that is easy to maintain. Users benefit through single sign-on, even when they are working from home, from the road, or from a workstation that is not their own.

New Security Management Capabilities

AccessMaster's new Internet and firewall management capabilities will be available first for Bull's NetWall firewall, announced today at a license fee of $625 per firewall. Raptor Systems and Bull are currently working on the integration of Raptor's Eagle firewall with AccessMaster. Support for firewalls from Raptor and other leading vendors will be added in the first half of 1997. NetWall is an advanced, flexible firewall that protects corporate networks while workers use public networks like the Internet. Features include advanced dynamic packet filtering, application filtering, rules-based filtering, address translation, anti-IP spoofing, and security audit and alert.

In addition to firewall management, AccessMaster provides a range of other security services that help manage the Internet and corporate Intranets. Through the use of the Generic Security Service (GSS) API, AccessMaster secures the otherwise highly exposed link between a remote workstation coming across a public network and the corporate firewall.

A central audit service enables administrators to analyze any event issuing from a firewall or other protected device. This allows administrators to easily correlate events, revealing suspicious patterns of activity. Administrators can also filter and monitor outbound as well as inbound traffic, ensuring that nobody sends unauthorized information outside the organization. In 1997, AccessMaster will secure, via GSS-API, Java-based Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer applications. This will enable AccessMaster to secure client/server applications over the Internet.

"The key to extending security across public networks like the Internet is to solve the challenge of establishing and maintaining trusted relationships between different domains," Derue said. "AccessMaster addresses this by instituting a trusted relationship between two domains using the Secure European System for Applications in Multivendor Environments (SESAME) and Distributed Computing Environment (DCE) protocols as its distributed security technology."