Announcing R80 Security Management

May you live in interesting times. While it’s debatable this phrase originated as a Chinese curse – I’ve had my share of inventive Chinese curses hurled at me while growing up in Asia and this one certainly never came up – it does appear that Security teams are currently living in interesting and challenging times. Disruptive technologies like cloud computing, a flood of connected devices and the incessant bombardment of threats, all contribute to the complexity of managing security.

At Check Point, we believe the key to managing this complexity is through consolidation – bringing all security protections and functions under one umbrella. The R80 security management platform, a result of numerous conversations with our customers and many years of R&D, is the culmination of that vision.

As I spoke to different customers who tested R80 during its early availability phase, I got different answers on why they think R80 is important to them. This is because, with R80, we are seeking to redefine the way security is managed on so many different levels – from the way you manage policy to how you work and collaborate, to how you view risk.

For the security manager tired of dealing with one too many consoles, R80 provides a single platform to manage the data center, head-quarters, remote branches, private and public cloud deployments. A unified policy can now manage users, devices, applications, data and networks, allowing for more accurate policy administration and security consistency across the network.

For the distributed security team, R80 provides a seamless way for multiple administrators to work simultaneously without colliding or overwriting each other’s efforts. An administrator can also have multiple sessions open and be able to publish incremental sessions without having to deploy the entire policy.*

For the SOC team managing hybrid cloud environments, R80 policies can be granularly segmented into policy layers, with each layer aligned to hyper-segmented cloud networks. Integrations with cloud platforms like VMware’s NSX, Cisco’s ACI and Microsoft’s Azure automate security provisioning within these cloud environments.

For the CISO looking to better align security with IT, the ability to define granular permissions to API integrations means that secure integrations can be made with IT processes and systems across the IT ecosystem. This paves the way for security teams to confidently deploy automated security workflows and controls.

For the lean, overworked security team mired in too many tickets, R80 makes it possible to automate or farm out routine tasks. Via a web services portal, IT teams or business units can independently provision new hosts, servers or users without having to go through the security team. For example, integrations with ticketing systems can streamline the help desk support process. It’s a win-win situation for the security team – routine tasks are off-loaded and SLA is improved.

For the security administrator going about his daily tasks, we’ve streamlined the interface to minimize the number of clicks needed to perform a task or access critical data. For example, logs and rule history integrated into the policy dashboard make it easier to troubleshoot policy.

For the security risk manager or auditor, we’ve integrated threat management into the main console so that logging, monitoring, event correlation and reporting are all within a tab’s reach. A single dashboard provides a comprehensive, highly visual display of security across the network, with quick drill-downs to event details and incident response. This dashboard is highly customizable so you can focus on monitoring what’s important to you. A built-in policy compliance tab shows where you stand against recommended Check Point policy settings, helping you optimize your policies. Reports can be custom-tailored to stakeholder need and can be accessed via a web browser.

In a nutshell, R80 consolidates all aspects of your security functions on a single platform that helps you be more efficient, organized and effective in managing your security. Download the white paper here.

And having started this blog with a “curse”, it is only fitting that I end it on a more harmonious note:

“It is the harmony of the diverse parts, their symmetry, their happy balance; in a word it is all that introduces order, all that gives unity, that permits us to see clearly and to comprehend at once both the ensemble and the details.” – Henri Poincare.

*Available with R80.10