Cisco Expands Its Network Admission Control Framework

Cisco Systems today announced advancements to its Network Admission Control (NAC) framework that help protect organizations from threats such as spyware, viruses and worms attempting to gain network access through a growing number of endpoint devices.

The Cisco NAC framework now includes support for Cisco Catalyst switch and wireless solutions, the expansion of the NAC partner program to include a new agentless auditing category, and enhancements to the NAC appliance family (formerly known as the Cisco Clean Access family). Together these advancements expand upon the Cisco Self-Defending Network security strategy that helps customers better identify, prevent and adapt to an ever-changing landscape of security threats.

“Companies the world over are continually looking to help ensure they protect and have control over all devices gaining access to the company network, in compliance with ever tightening corporate security policies,” said Chris Thatcher , North American principal consultant for security for Dimension Data, a global IT services and solutions provider. “The advancements to the NAC framework mean that organizations are now able to take more advantage of their network infrastructure, security and management software investments and help enable the assessment of the security state of wired and wireless clients. This allows organizations to help enforce security policy by either granting or denying access to network resources based on client compliance with security policy. This will help provide an even more secure network environment via this controlled access.”