Sophos launches network security division

Sophos' acquisition of Astaro will see the former offer a network security division.

The completion of the acquisition that was announced on 6 May, will combine endpoint protection with unified threat management (UTM). Once integration is complete, the Sophos portfolio of security products will combine Astaro's network security with Sophos' threat expertise with the initial integration of the Astaro Security Gateway and Sophos anti-virus.

Longer term, the integration will allow central management of anti-malware, web and data control policies across endpoint, mobile and network enforcement points, including consumer-owned mobile devices and branch, home or remote offices.

Also upon completing Astaro partner certification, Sophos partners will have access to the full network security portfolio.

Jan Hichert, co-founder and former CEO of Astaro and now Sophos' senior vice president and general manager of network security, said: “We founded Astaro with the mission of bringing network security products to organisations of all sizes and accomplished this goal by creating easy-to-use, UTM solutions that addressed several facets of network security.  However, as the threat landscape continued to evolve it became clear that gateway security alone would no longer be sufficient to effectively secure a network.”

This article originally appeared at scmagazineuk.com