The addition of visualization and monitoring technologies to one of Computer Associates International Inc.’s products is giving network managers and administrators the ability to take a closer look at employee activities.
CA’s eTrust 20/20 was launched at CA World 2002 in Orlando, Fla., last month where Sanjay Kumar, president of the Islandia, N.Y.-based software company, said with the continuous importance placed on security, CA found there was a disconnect between hardware and software security practices.
He also noted that practically every company monitors access to its systems. “While companies have the right to do that, we think there is a better way. My company can look at me logging on to e-mail and I prefer that they do that to protect me from intrusion.
“But I would prefer they not sit and watch all day. I would rather they use some sort of intelligent tool to figure this out,” Kumar said.
eTrust 20/20 collects log files from different sources and collects information from physical access controls and combines them to allow administrators to watch for abnormalities in employee behaviour. “How do you figure out what is normal behaviour or abnormal behaviour? That is a lot of visualization,” Kumar said.
The tool can visualize the floor plans of a building and can use physical access points to track an employee’s movements. The system will then create what would be the normal boundaries for employees’ physical and electronic movements. This will allow the system to set an alert when there is abnormal behaviour.
Kumar admitted there will be some false alarms at first, but said the system will incorporate different situations into its boundaries. eTrust 20/20 will take a copy of the footprint of the original program, which means hackers would have to get into the source and change it to wreak any form of sabotage, according to Kumar.
This product will be the first from CA to be offered on a subscription pay rate, and price ranges from tens of thousands of dollars up to a million.
There are several different visualizations clients can pick from – an icon-based simulation, a blueprint version and a virtual hallway and room visualization, to start. The technology behind some of the system is still patent pending, but Kumar said he expects it to be available later this year.
Consult the company’s Web site for more information at http://www.ca.com.
