HOPKINTON, Mass., Aug. 9 -- RSA, The Security Division of EMC, today announced its intent to acquire Tablus Inc., a leading provider of data loss prevention solutions based in San Mateo, California. Tablus is privately-held; further details of the transaction are not being disclosed.
The Tablus solution will add industry-leading data discovery and classification, monitoring, and data loss prevention capabilities to RSA's data security portfolio, helping to enable the company to better meet the market's need for information-centric security by: finding and identifying sensitive data; preventing that data from "leaking" outside the organization; and simplifying the management of data security through policy-driven controls.
"Information security has clearly become an information management problem: today, many organizations struggle to establish exactly what data they have and where it all is -- let alone how sensitive it is," said Art Coviello, Executive Vice President at EMC and President of RSA. "The hard reality of information security is that you cannot secure what you cannot manage, and you cannot manage what you cannot find. Once completed, this acquisition will significantly expand our ability to help organizations of all sizes truly secure their data - and accelerate our mission to bring information-centric security to life."
Locating and Classifying the Data
Data discovery and classification is a critical first step towards securing data in most organizations, as IT departments grapple with an explosion of digital information to store, manage and protect. This challenge is complicated by the fact that sensitive data exists in three different forms (database records; messages, such as email; and loose files) and in three different contexts (at-rest on datacenter storage; in-motion through the network; or in-use on laptops, mobile devices and portable storage). Comprehensive data discovery and classification must directly address this complexity.
To that end, RSA will combine Tablus' products with the EMC Infoscape intelligent information management solution to create a common "platform" that is engineered to enable organizations to discover, classify and take policy-based action on all of their data. Specifically, Tablus' expertise in quickly and accurately locating and protecting valuable intellectual property, sensitive personal information, and security-related content will be combined with Infoscape's solutions for managing data according to specific governance requirements regarding retention and archiving, as well as preparation for litigation support through e-discovery.
Preventing Data Loss
An understanding of the information landscape gives organizations the ability to establish and enforce data security policy and prevent data loss. This enforcement can take many forms, from data erasure, bulk encryption and digital rights management to simple movement and quarantine. These various enforcement mechanisms need to be applied at different points in the IT system: at the point of storage, at the point of creation, or at other times in the network.
In recognition of this reality, RSA plans not only to integrate the Tablus offering with its existing data control assets in the fields of encryption, key management and information rights management, but also to partner openly with industry leaders to enable policy-driven enforcement of data security where it makes the most sense.
"Data loss prevention is the battlefront in today's information security war, and winning that battle is going to require a united effort from the leaders in information technology. RSA is committed to building an ecosystem -- through partnerships with leading information technology providers -- that enables the common administration and shared enforcement of data security policies," said Dennis Hoffman, Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer at RSA. "Our goal is to enable, elevate and simplify the management of data security -- providing organizations with a richness of knowledge and range of protection options for their data that simply doesn't exist today."
Simplifying Data Security Management Through Policy-Based Controls
The ability to establish, enforce and audit data security policy is central to this vision. Specifically, enabling policy-driven data security controls throughout the infrastructure that are fully and mutually interoperable would not only address the data security problem, but also the associated cost of operation. Together with RSA's data security assets, EMC Infoscape and strategic partners, the core technology and intellectual property of Tablus will allow organizations to build robust policy around sensitive data, and distribute the enforcement of that policy as needed when that data is copied, moved or accessed.
"We are excited to be joining forces with RSA, an organization that has set the standard in data security for decades," said Anne Bonaparte, President and CEO of Tablus. "I am confident that Tablus' employees, solutions and services will make strong contributions to RSA's offering and both companies' customers can look forward to reaping the benefits of this compelling combination."
The acquisition of Tablus is expected to be completed early in the fourth quarter of 2007, subject to customary closing conditions.
