Business Ready Security at WPC 2009
This week in New Orleans, Microsoft is hosting the annual Worldwide Partner Conference where Microsoft made several identity and security announcements as part of their Business Ready Security strategy including the following:
o Forefront codename “Stirling” - the next generation of the Forefront Security Suite will be officially known as Forefront Protection Suite (FPS). FPS will include the products in the current suite, plus the Forefront Protection Manager (formerly known as the “Stirling” management console) and the Forefront Threat Management Gateway Web Security Service.
o FPS pricing will remain the same as the current Forefront Security Suite and all of the component solutions will continue to be licensed on a subscription basis. They will also be available independently, with Forefront Protection Manager included. (Note that the Forefront Threat Management Gateway license is sold separately on a per processor basis.) The new FPS solutions are currently in beta and final versions will ship over the course of the latter half of 2009 and the first half of 2010.
o Microsoft also announced thatForefront Unified Access Gateway beta 2 is available for download at www.microsoft.com/forefront. UAG provides secure, virtually anywhere access to messaging, collaboration and other applications, increasing productivity and policy compliance. UAG also extends the benefits of Windows DirectAccess across the enterprise, enhancing scalability, deployment and management.
At WPC Microsoft also announced the following new product solution names:
o Forefront Endpoint Protection 2010 - current version is Forefront Client Security
o Forefront Protection 2010 for Exchange Server - current version is Forefront Security for Exchange Server
o Forefront Protection 2010 for SharePoint - current version is Forefront Security for SharePoint
o Forefront Online Protection for Exchange - currently called Forefront Online Security for Exchange
o Forefront Threat Management Gateway Web Security Service - the next generation of ISA Server 2006.
For more information on this announcement please check out the WPC virtual press room or the Microsoft Forefront & Windows Server team blog.