Xceedium, Inc., the provider of access control and audit services, has announced the launch of Xceedium GateKeeper Version 5. Delivering the next generation of access, the Xceedium GateKeeper appliance proactively enforces policies to protect critical infrastructure and information assets.

GateKeeper Version 5 features full support for mainframe and virtual environments, and reflects the evolving requirements for access control and audit for centralized computing models. Now companies can apply its patented technologies to contain users to authorized areas, track, record and deliver targeted reports and more easily and cost effectively meet compliance requirements.

The Xceedium Gatekeeper is a hardened appliance that helps companies to remotely manage the activities of high-risk users from a central point to anywhere in the heterogeneous IT infrastructure. Implementation is easy, and does not require modification of legacy systems.

Using a unique access method and patent-pending technologies, the Xceedium GateKeeper compartmentalizes and contains high-risk users, then monitors, alerts, logs, records and reports on all their activities inside the critical IT infrastructure. IT administrators, application developers, vendors and technical contractors can securely access critical IT resources, from both inside and outside the organization, without leaving a footprint. Auditors can monitor all user events and view centralized reports for accountability and testing of controls. Enterprise and government clients rely on the Xceedium GateKeeper to balance audit and compliance requirements with the need for operational efficiency.

“Enterprises are seeking security solutions that integrate within their existing infrastructures,” stated Eric Ogren, principal analyst of the Ogren Group.

“The Xceedium Gatekeeper inspects and audits user traffic in real-time, allowing organizations to tighten access controls to both physical and virtual resources while enforcing and demonstrating access controls for compliance. This pragmatic approach helps companies embrace the dynamic security needs of outsourced work forces, data center consolidation, and other events,” said Ogren.

“Compliance and security mandates are driving customers to require access, enforcement and audit in single solution,” added Cheryl Traverse, CEO and president of Xceedium. “This release of GateKeeper enables organizations to encompass new technologies along with legacy infrastructure along with their current mainframe infrastructure while enforcing security controls aligned with today’s compliance and regulatory requirements. It also allows them to make the transition to a virtual environment with full confidence that their information assets are safeguarded and user activity is being tracked and unauthorized use prevented.”

Xceedium GateKeeper said it offers full support for mainframe and virtual environments. Main components are restrictive zero footprint, clientless compartmentalization, containment to authorized areas and command restriction, Real-Time remediation; and audit and compliance (full-session recording).

“With Version 5, Xceedium continues to build on our groundbreaking unique access control, policy enforcement and audit capabilities by extending these features to mainframe and virtualized environments,” said Kern Weissman, senior director of product management, Xceedium. “This release is a direct response to the business needs of our customers who increasingly require the same zero footprint access, command filtering and full-session recording for these environments.”