KEMP adds new security features to load balancers

Following Microsoft’s decision to discontinue its Forefront Threat Management Gateway (TMG) last year, KEMP Technologies has announced the availability of its new Edge Security Pack for the KEMP LoadMaster range of load balancer and application delivery controllers. The Edge Security Pack (ESP) provides additional security features to fill the gap left by TMG and to help companies protect business-critical, web-facing applications from unauthorised access. ESP integrates the most-widely used features found in TMG into the load balancer, including end-point Pre-Authorisation, Single Sign-On across multiple virtual services and Persistent Logging to track who is accessing virtual services and when.

As companies increase their deployment of web-facing applications, there is an increasing need for load balancers to provide high availability and minimize application security threats. “Microsoft may have withdrawn its Forefront TMG from the market, but businesses still need to protect applications such as Exchange and SharePoint from unauthorized use,” said Peter Melerud, EVP of product management at KEMP Technologies. “The addition of the Edge Security Pack will deliver superior protection alongside high-performance, reliable and scalable load balancing for the increasing number of hardware or virtual servers used to support the growth in Internet-facing applications.”

The new security capabilities build on existing core technologies in the KEMP LoadMaster range such as the reverse proxy function and include:

• End Point Authentication for Pre-Authorisation
To access virtual services on the LoadMaster, clients must provide authentication information to validate the client’s right to access workload servers using Active Directory. When successfully authenticated, the client can access the service or will be blocked until valid credentials are provided.

• Persistent Logging and Reporting for User Logging
Improved logging and reporting capabilities will monitor and track who is accessing virtual services and determine any unusual activities, including failed log-ins.

• Single Sign-On across Virtual Services
KEMP LoadMasters are designed to handle multiple virtual services supporting unique workloads, joined together into Single Sign-On groups. The ESP will enable clients to only enter authentication information for the first virtual service in order to access all other services in the Single Sign-On group. Therefore, a client accessing Exchange will also be able to access SharePoint and other workloads in the same group.

For 13 years KEMP has led the development of load balancers and ADCs and is ideally positioned to extend its security features to address the increased need for edge security. “For organisations facing life without TMG, the addition of security features into their load balancers will continue to deliver protection along with scalability and high reliability,” said Leigh Bradford, UK & Ireland Sales Manager for KEMP. “And with these features launched at no additional cost, this option will be highly attractive to our channel partners and their customers.”