Our framework provides a robust approach to cloud security – effectively building a secure bridge between an organization and the cloud. To accomplish this, we enable businesses to extend their own corporate security policies into the cloud through three major data streams – email, web, and identity driven traffic. By securing these three streams, along with real-time protection from threats originating in the cloud, businesses can save time, resources, and gain business agility without the fear or data loss or compromise. McAfee is committed to continuously improving the security capabilities offered through the Cloud Security Platform, as demonstrated through the updates delivered in this release, including:

• Enhanced integration. Data Loss Prevention is now integrated into both Email Protection and Web Gateway solutions, providing the ability to stop data leakage through these streams of traffic. Also, Web Protection now features common policy enforcement and reporting whether deployed on-premises or as a service.
• Securing mobile workers. The addition of McAfee Client Proxy to our Web Protection solution enables seamless authentication and routing of web traffic regardless of user location, whether on-premises or mobile via SaaS.
• Advanced policy management. McAfee Web Gateway can now query external sources, i.e. Google’s YouTube API, to apply context-aware policies based on criteria such as content categorization.  Also, administrators can now factor in various identity attributes, such as device type, to set their cloud access control policies.

In every update to our Cloud Security Platform, we push the industry standard for protecting businesses in a cloud environment forward to a new level. As with every piece of our connected security portfolio, we are always innovating in ways which make doing business in the digital world more secure. Expect progress. Expect security, even in the cloud.

 This quote came from Andy Grove, Intel Co-founder and former CEO.  And, while he said this at an annual meeting in 1998, his philopsophy is timeless.  In my opinion, social networking is at the crux of this inflection point.  Enterprises recognize that they must begin to embrace social networking – with its extraordinary potential– but doing so has its own set of challenges.

 The Gen-Ys entering the workforce have been raised in an instant communication digital age. For them, social media is how they communicate now and how they expect to communicate in the future as business professionals. Corporations that have strict security policies tell me that their ability to hire fresh talent is difficult because they are competing with companies that have a more “open” social media policy.  

 On the flip side, many corporations are leveraging full-blown social media strategies to reach out to their customers. On my own personal Facebook account, I’ve “friended” a number of artists, as well as local and global companies I admire, and it’s evident that it’s one of the most cost effective means of communicating directly with a captive audience. So, doesn’t it seem ironic that the same companies that are using this medium to market their products are the same ones that are locking down their employees’ access to it?

 But let’s be fair.  The businesses that are limiting access to sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin are simply worried that too much information sharing will result in lost productivity, data leaks, and sometimes a diluted culture. But, even more concerning to IT security people is that the sites most visited by employees are malware magnets that have been exploited by hackers — stealing identities, distributing viruses, and sending spam.  And, the security risks are only getting worse.  

 So where’s the balance?  How do we inject fundamental change into a social fabric that has such strong fibers? I believe the solution is to allow corporations to embrace social media, while providing them with technology that allows them to monitor, or limit, its use. These technologies can also be leveraged to ensure that corporate sensitive information does not inadvertently (or purposefully) leak onto these open platforms.  The McAfee Cloud Security Platform is an option that integrates modules capable of protecting against the worst social networking has to offer, and may be the only way to make today’s security strategic inflection point a positive one.

 McAfee launched this platform last year to protect data to and from the cloud through the major traffic channels: Web, Email and Authentication/Identity – including social media platforms. We’ve continued to innovate and enhance the products included in this platform to secure businesses from growing online threats.  I encourage you to learn more about how the McAfee Cloud Security Platform can help you and your business be protected while allowing social networking to thrive.

Employees are going to leverage the cloud in ways that enable productivity, and they have the right to do so. Take collaborative file sharing for example. Gone are the days when you had to load a large file onto a USB drive to share with colleagues across the office, or customers around the world. Now, using services such as Box, employees can upload large presentations, video files, and virtually anything else to the cloud and simply share a link. With a broadband connection, this sharing is almost instant. While this may be a game-changer for employees, it also changes the security landscape.

With the freedom to upload just about anything to a file sharing site, obvious red flags arise. What about sensitive data? Can access to these files be controlled by more than just a simple username and password? These are valid questions that anyone in IT should be asking. In collaboration with Box, you can learn how Intel and McAfee address these issues, and enable secure collaborative file sharing that can be a game changer for employee productivity.

Join us on April 26 at 1:00 PM EDT to discover the lifecycle of secure collaborative file sharing, brought to you by Intel, McAfee, and Box. Visit the following link to register: http://software.intel.com/en-us/articles/collaboration-cloud-webinar/?partnerref=blogs_box_webinar 

Bonus: Qualified Attendees will receive a free enterprise trial account from Box!