Check Point touts rogue apps security tool

Employees have a lax attitude to enterprise app security, says Check Point

Enterprise security firm Check Point has announced an update to its gateway appliance designed to tackle the growing number of rogue applications being used in the workplace.

According to a survey by the firm, carried out with the Ponemon Institute, over half of enterprise employees overlook internal security and policies in order to use applications such as those found on Facebook, and are putting their business, productivity and company-wide bandwidth at risk.

Helping these firms to address such issues, Check Point has added a new blade component to its gateway appliance which could protect enterprises against the ‘sheer amount’ of malware threats and vulnerabilities that they may be exposed to, according to the vendor's global head of network security, Gabi Reish.

“If you don’t know what applications your users are using, you don’t know what risks you are exposing yourself to,” he explained.

“The sheer amount of applications presents a challenging environment to administrators.”

Reish explained that the Application Control Software Blade will give administrators an overview of what is being used, and by whom.

As well as giving this birds eye view to administrators, the blade will also involve end-users in the decision making process by alerting them to the problems inherent in using a particular application, according to Reish. This works by presenting the user with an alert about the application, and its potential risks, before allowing a download.

Reish explained that rather than apply a lock on all application downloads, the blade will let administrators make informed decisions about who can use what, and when.

Sales and marketing teams, for example, could benefit from using Facebook, while for others, access to the site and its apps would be counter productive. As such it allows for granular controls down to the individual user level.

“It is an app-awareness tool,” he explained. “It lets firms understand who is using what, and solves the problem of blocking everything - which for a lot of enterprises, is not the right approach.”

Reish said that the blade was updated regularly, meaning that even new applications are covered.

The product is slated for release in the fourth quarter of this year, although pricing is currently unavailable.