Fortinet Extends Cloud Security with Four New Virtual Appliances

Fortinet (News - Alert), a network security provider and the worldwide company of unified threat management “UTM” solutions, has announced four new virtual appliances that extend the company's ability to deliver security across virtualized and cloud environments.

The FortiGate, FortiManager, FortiAnalyzer and FortiMail virtual appliances combine with physical appliances to provide customers with a choice of physical and virtual form factors, working together to mitigate security blind spots and increase security controls within virtualized infrastructure environments. In addition, the combined solution provides a deeper integration into the virtual environments many customers have adopted, enabling the company to expand the reach of its consolidated security further within the virtual movement.

Risks associated with blind spots in the virtual environment, along with the lack of security controls, become increasingly problematic as the size of virtual environments grow. By giving customers a choice of physical and virtual appliances, Fortinet is providing a 'single pane of glass' management platform that allows them the flexibility to use a combination of physical and virtual appliances together in order to achieve the right mix of performance, visibility, and control.

Fortinet's virtual security appliances were built to run on top of VMware hypervisors. The new FortiGate virtual appliances help secure network infrastructures with integrated, multi-threat security. Like a traditional FortiGate appliance, a FortiGate virtual appliance protects infrastructure from a broad array of threats by enabling customers to consolidate their stand-alone security technologies, reducing the complexity of their security infrastructure. Customers can combine firewall, VPN, intrusion prevention, malware prevention, application security and complete content protection, data loss prevention, Web filtering, antispam, and have the added advantage of being able to inspect inter-zone traffic. In addition, FortiGate virtual appliances can be used in conjunction with traditional FortiGate appliances to help ensure both the perimeter and the virtual layers within a virtual environment are protected, visible and easy to manage.