Startup Boosts Internal Security

January 24, 2006: US startup PacketMotion has found a way to monitor who in your company is accessing what data and when, turning invisible insidious threats visible before you can even say ‘compliance’.

PacketSentry is an agentless, software/hardware combination that tracks and records activity on a network without, according to PacketMotion, hindering performance. It monitors who’s doing what with data and applications over a network and stores this information for later auditing if needed.

The hardware comes in the form of a 2U rack mounted probe and a 1U manager device. The probe monitors data at the switch level, gathering data and sending it to the manager which imports it to a Microsoft SQL database for analysis. PacketMotion claim that the system has enough space to enable years of tracking information to be stored, helping with annual compliance auditing.

Internal security is increasingly popping up on the radar as organisations strive to protect their intellectual property and become compliant. PacketMotion claims that its software is the first to provide an internal network security solution, and while it may not allow blocking of data, it does provide the means to rapidly track down security breeches.

An Australian industry source told IDM that it strikes them as “…something that would require a fair amount of configuration, and need ongoing maintenance to ensure it knows what and who it is monitoring.”

“As far I can tell, it doesn’t actually do any security, it just reports on it. Only providing tracking information however, is still very useful.”

PacketSentry is currently available in the US, IDM is awaiting details on Australian availability.

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