Unified Threat Management, Demystified
Considering unified threat management (UTM) appliances that combine many security jobs? Here's some advice from CIOs who've tried these all-in-wonders on for size.
Checkfree was able to consolidate 20 IDS devices, 20 switches and 26 firewalls onto seven of Crossbeam's X-series appliances. Cost savings? Nearly $200,000 per year, with ROI in about three years, he says.
Isenberg disagrees with those who say UTMs create the risk of a single point of failure. In fact, he believes the opposite: "Every additional box creates more failure points."
John South, the Plexent security consultant, says Crossbeam is one of the few companies taking a hybrid approach. "All of the major players are designing point devices for secure services or packaging services into various sizes of appliances scaled from small to medium businesses up to large enterprises."
The debate over UTM vs. best-of-breed is really a debate that you must decide within your enterprise's walls. As Vordick puts it: "Risk tolerance and understanding the tradeoffs in the different platforms are decisions each company has to make."
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