Common Criteria Certification Awarded to PBS Professional

Altair Engineering, a major player in software solutions that make high performance computing (HPC) faster, simpler and smarter, has announced that PBS Professional version 10.1 has achieved Common Criteria EAL3+ certification.

Common Criteria is the international standard for certifying software technology conforms to stringent security requirements. This certification is internationally recognized under the Common Criteria Recognition Agreement (CCRA).

Officials with Altair Engineering claimed that PBS Professional is the only technology in its class to achieve Common Criteria EAL3+ certification.

Independent testing and evaluation was performed by atsec information security under the CC scheme of the German Federal Office for Information Security.

'The Department of Defense (DoD) High Performance Computing Modernization Program (HPCMP) has made a 10-year commitment to PBS Professional, serving as the single workload management capability on all of our HPC systems. The EAL3+ security certification recently obtained by Altair Engineering for PBS Professional significantly improves our security posture,' said a senior DoD official, in a statement.

"PBS Professional is the first and only HPC job scheduling and management software to meet the stringent requirements of the Common Criteria at EAL3+,' said Bill Nitzberg, CTO, PBS Works. Nitzberg said that independent, non-biased testing confirms that the company's software design, development, delivery and support processes provide customers like the DoD with the highest levels of security.

'We're proud to have worked with Altair and BSI on the Common Criteria evaluation of PBS Professional,' said Ken Hake, Common Criteria Laboratory Manager, atsec US.

Hake said that the successful certification shows the versatility of the Common Criteria and its applicability to a wide range of software products.

'Attaining the Common Criteria certification assures that our government customers can attain the highest levels of security and reliability by combining PBS Professional with high performance SGI systems like Altix 4700 and Altix ICE,' said Jim Brinker, VP of Federal Sales, at SGI.

Brinker said that Altair's HPC workload management solution's EAL3+ certification ensures that the government customers can meet their security requirements as they deploy highly scalable HPC solutions.