Breaking News - mValent Adds Support to Automate PCI Compliance
mValent, a provider of application configuration management solutions, today announced it is shipping a new module designed to help IT teams comply with the Payment Card Industry's (PCI) Data Security Standard. The vendor’s new PCI Compliance Automation Module is an extension of its mValent Integrity application configuration management software.
The software is intended to address threats that come from both the outside and inside of companies, Jim Hickey, CMO, mValent, told 5 Minute Briefing. "Some of those inside threats are malicious but many are unintentional." The new PCI Compliance Automation Module helps customers understand risk areas as they relate to configuration changes.
"We have several customers who used our standard product to help them with their PCI compliance audits and they really opened up our eyes to the abilities of our product to help them in certain targeted areas in PCI compliance," said Hickey. According to Hickey, mValent found that while there were a number of things customers were able to do with the standard product, those efforts would "certainly be improved and enhanced if we actually did some engineering work behind this." To achieve this, he said, "we have crafted what we call an automation module" which is a separate option on top of mValent Integrity.
With the release of the PCI Compliance Automation Module, customers can use mValent Integrity to ensure that security controls adhere to company standards at a fine level, across all systems, and also safeguard against rogue access to systems by limiting access to authorized personnel - ensuring that all "back doors" are closed. The solution also can be used to monitor changes to system services so that any insecure protocols or services are always disabled, and alert IT management to changes in access controls, permissions, and system services. For more information, go here.
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DataDirect Bundles Data Integration Offerings
DataDirect Technologies, the data connectivity and mainframe integration unit of Progress Software, announced the availability of a new offering that combines DataDirect Technologies' existing XML-based technologies into one package, with a single installation.
The new DataDirect Data Integration Suite combines DataDirect XQuery, DataDirect XML Converters and Stylus Studio products into a set of lightweight components intended to provide design and runtime capabilities for standards-based data integration in traditional and SOA environments. With the ability to integrate data from heterogeneous data sources and varied data formats, the DataDirect Data Integration Suite helps maximize developer productivity by reducing the need for manual coding.
While the three products had been sold by DataDirect as independent offerings, the new suite reflects the fact that "most people were ending up using these products jointly," Dr. Carlo Innocenti, senior XML program manager for DataDirect Technologies, told 5 Minute Briefing. "The idea behind the DataDirect Integration Suite is to make it easier for users to do what was already happening in the real world." It will help them in "downloading a single package and being able to get a unified picture from us in terms of a well-structured data integration story around XML," said Innocenti. It is "a convenience for users to be able to think about the products as a single solution offering," he added.
The DataDirect Data Integration Suite includes a set of tools that provide drag-and-drop mapping; code generation and debugging for Java and C# for .NET; as well as other rapid application development tools for XML and related XML technologies such as XQuery, XSLT, Web services and XML pipelines. The suite also provides easy access and query capabilities for a range of heterogeneous data sources, including relational databases, XML and flat files - all of which can be integrated into a single result for XML-based business-to-business data interchange or other formats such as HTML or PDF. The suite also provides the ability to bi-directionally convert "virtually any data file" - including EDI, flat files, and other legacy formats - to ready-to-use XML, accessible from any Java or .NET application. For more information, go here.
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StreamFoundry Targets Service Management on Mainframes
StreamFoundry, Inc. (SFI) announced that CMS (Central Management System) 3.0 is now available using DB2 and z/OS. CMS, according to the vendor, is the only dedicated service management solution for problem, incident, change, configuration, and request management that runs on the IBM mainframe. The new release, using DB2, is intended to offer greater flexibility for process adaptation, integration with other applications, development and reporting.
"Scalability, embracing ITIL v.3 and centralizing management" are the key focus areas in CMS 3.0, Marc Heimlich, vice president of marketing and sales at SFI, told 5 Minute Briefing. "Going from InfoMan to DB2 as a database is exciting for us because we offer the same scalability and process flexibility that we think is unrivaled, yet we are doing it using DB2 as the back end versus InfoMan," he said. "We think this will greatly expand our marketplace."
SFI will offer out-of-the-box integration with the IBM Tivoli Application Dependency Discovery Manager (TADDM) running on z/Linux. TADDM helps users discover and map configuration item (CI) relationships and dependencies in real time and addresses compliance requirements.
With the majority of mission-critical operations provisioned and maintained on the IBM mainframe, SFI also said it offers the only Web-enabled service management suite that operates exclusively on the host that conforms to Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) protocols.
ITIL v.3, the latest release of the specification, "really marries IT with business," said Heimlich. Considering the high percentage of the world's data still resides on the mainframe and the core operations from a business perspective that are run on the mainframe, Heimlich said, "there is tremendous synergy to having your service management run in the same place as your core operations - which I think is really at the heart of what ITIL v.3 is getting at."
A key advantage of the release is centralized management with a service management hub that connects virtually to the rest of the environment - "whether it is at the network, server, application or even business operation level," said Heimlich. "The surest way to minimize service disruptions is to have a service management solution that can from a problem perspective drive mean time to repair and from a change perspective give you that overall snapshot into what is going on in the overall environment."
Additional key highlights of the new release are a Web 2.0 user interface; "Google-like" search capability; tight unification of problem; change and configuration driving impact analysis; dynamic field relationships; and customized reporting. For more information, go here.
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Tripwire Extends Configuration Assessment to VMware ESX 3.0 Environments
Tripwire, a configuration assessment and change auditing tools provider, has begun shipping a free utility that assesses configuration settings for both VMware ESX 3.0 and 3.5 hypervisors, while determining potential configuration risks and providing remediation advice. The new tool, Tripwire ConfigCheck for VMware ESX 3.0, is the result of "a joint collaboration between ourselves and VMware,” Mark Gaydos, Tripwire vice president of marketing, told 5 Minute Briefing. “We created this using their hardening guidelines."
Tripwire ConfigCheck provides an assessment of the configurations of a VMware ESX hypervisor, comparing them against VMware hardening security guidelines, which are best practice recommendations for optimal security in virtual environments, and provides remediation instructions if any are needed. With ConfigCheck, customers get visibility into risks that might exist in their virtual environment due to misconfiguration, and are advised of recommended fixes to any configuration settings that could present future risk.
The first version of ConfigCheck, introduced in June, supported just VMWare ESX 3.5 environments "and, to date, we have had close to 32,000 people come to the ConfigCheck microsite and get information about it, download the utility or download the remediation PDF," said Gaydos. "With this new release, we not only support 3.5, but we also support 3.0," he said. "We have heard a majority of the implementations out there are 3.0 - so this actually will appeal to an even larger audience."
In addition to offering immediate insight into vulnerabilities in virtual environments, Tripwire also provides a remediation guide to help in returning both VMware ESX 3.0 and 3.5 hosts to a known, secure state. "We will show you where you are in alignment or out of alignment with those specific configuration settings and then secondly if you are out of alignment you can click on a button and we will show you remediation advice." Tripwire ConfigCheck and the Tripwire Remediation Guide are available for free and can be downloaded here.
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Bus-Tech Certifies Interoperability with IBM Storage
Bus-Tech, a provider of mainframe-based virtual tape solutions, announced that its Mainframe Data Library (MDL), Mainframe Appliance for Storage (MAS) and zDASD products have successfully completed interoperability testing with IBM's System Storage N series, DS4000, DS3000 and SAN Volume Controller (SVC) products and has been confirmed as “IBM System Storage Proven” with third-party products.
"Comprehensive testing for IBM System Storage Proven, along with IBM Server Proven with System z, provides customers with assurance of smooth integration with IBM System Storage Disk products as well as integration into the IBM mainframe environment," stated Bus-Tech president Al Brandt at the time of the announcement.
Bus-Tech's MDL, MAS and zDASD products provide storage solutions for the mainframe that use Open Systems disk storage. Bus-Tech's Virtual Tape solutions are intended to enable SME and large enterprise customers to reduce costs, complexity and risks, and improve response times by eliminating tape robotics and media from their mainframe tape environments.
The IBM System Storage Proven program supports the ability of independent hardware and software vendors to build solutions with the latest technology on leading storage platforms as well as reduce solution design time when multiple, tested building blocks have already been pre-tested. For more on Bus-Tech, go here.
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