Vendors Offer Storage SecurityVendors Offer Storage Security

Companies working to secure their IT infrastructures now have a tool to protect storage area networks and improve back-end security. NeoScale Systems Inc. last week unveiled its CryptoStor SAN VPN appliance for securing back-end communications related to storage networks.

The tool is designed to encrypt data as it moves across a long-distance storage network from one site to another. NeoScale says the appliance also will improve the performance of high-end networks such as synchronous optical networks.

Because the CryptoStor appliance is based on hardware and includes compression technology, it should help reduce latency, according to NeoScale. The vendor also has included AES-256 encryption with dynamic key exchange and a Secure Sockets Layer Web-based user interface for console management. CryptoStor begins shipping this week for $40,000.

Organizations that have to pay special attention to privacy, such as financial-services and insurance companies and the government, may be particularly interested in CryptoStor, says Stephanie Balaouras, an analyst at IT market-research firm the Yankee Group. "There's a gap with security on the metropolitan [SAN], because customers have to purchase some edge routers and deploy their own encryption," Balaouras says. "Service providers don't have the capability either, but they could partner with NeoScale."

Separately, Decru Inc. last week took the wraps off a storage-security option for use on the military's front lines. The Expeditionary Encrypted Data Store has a battle- and terrain-ready architecture that renders hard drives in the field useless should the enemy get ahold of them.

The Expeditionary Encrypted Data Store doesn't store information as standard text; instead, all information is encrypted. Military personnel type commands to render the information inaccessible by any unauthorized person. Backup keys are kept safely at locations such as headquarters, where personnel can restart the storage appliance after false alarms. The data store is priced at $100,000.