Unified Threat Management Solutions

Unified Threat Management (UTM) is a comprehensive solution that has recently emerged in the network security industry and since 2004, has gained widespread currency as a primary network gateway defence solution for organisations. In theory, it is the evolution of the traditional firewall into an all-inclusive security product that has the ability to perform multiple security functions in one single appliance: network firewalling, network intrusion prevention and gateway antivirus (AV), gateway anti-spam, VPN, content filtering, load balancing and on-appliance reporting.

The worldwide UTM market was approximately worth $1.2 billion in 2007, with a forecast of 35-40% compounded annual growth rate through 2011. Some of the leading UTM vendors include Astaro, Check Point, Fortinet, Juniper, SonicWall, Wiresoft, Untangle and Watchguard. The primary market of UTM providers is the SMB and Enterprise segment, although a few providers are now providing UTM solutions for small offices/remote offices.

The term UTM was originally coined by IDC, a leading market research firm. The advantages of unified security lies in the fact that rather than administering multiple systems that individually handle antivirus, content filtering, intrusion prevention and spam filtering functions, organisations now have the flexibility to deploy a single UTM appliance that takes over all their functionality into a single rack mountable network appliance.

How UTM secures the network

A single UTM appliance makes it very easy to manage a company's security strategy, with just one device to worry about, one source of support and a single way to maintain every aspect of your security solution. The UTM can prove to be more effective a solution as its strength lies in the bundle of solutions which are integrated and designed to work together. Also from one single centralised console, all the security solutions can be monitored and configured. Thus it tweaks the solutions to perfection.

In this context, UTMs represent all-in-one security appliances that carry firewall, VPN, gateway anti-virus, gateway anti-spam, intrusion prevention, content filtering, bandwidth management and centralized reporting as basic features. The UTM is thus, a highly integrated quiver of security solutions, working in tandem that systematically provides network security to organisations. As there is a customised OS holding all these security features at one place, they tend to work in unison, providing a very high throughput. The UTM can prove highly effective because its strength lies in the bundle of solutions which are integrated and designed to work together without treading on each other’s toes

Unified Threat Management (UTM) Solutions

Astaro

Check Point

Fortinet

McAfee

Juniper

Watchguard