New cloud-based security service

WatchGuard launched a cloud-based, web security service – Reputation Enabled Defense. Coupled with WatchGuard XTM or XCS security appliances, this service gives businesses and their employees protection against malware, botnets and other web-based threats.

According WatchGuard researchers, 38 percent of the web contains malicious code, and this number is growing exponentially. Additionally, 77 percent of websites with malicious code are legitimate sites that have been hijacked by hackers, which is directly attributable to why 57 percent of data theft occurs over the web.

“Safe Internet practices are no longer limited to avoiding high-risk websites or utilizing black and white lists,” said Charles Kolodgy, Research VP, Security Products at IDC. “Criminals are becoming more clever at injecting malware into innocuous websites, which forces businesses to throttle network throughput in order to scan every packet. An ideal solution to address this problem is the utilization of reputation services, which leverages the cloud to mitigate web-based threats.”

Reputation Enabled Defence delivers secure web browsing via a cloud-based reputation lookup that scores URLs as good, bad or unknown. The lookup leverages a dynamic global database that aggregates data from multiple feeds, including industry-leading anti-virus engines. URLs with bad reputations are immediately blocked, whereas URLs with good reputations can be accelerated through the network firewall.