By Geoff Fein
Raytheon [RTN] has partnered with California-based Narus to embed the network security company’s NarusInsight to monitor Internet traffic and help manage and protect government networks.
“We have been working for a while now with Narus and have culminated in a partnership which involves both incorporating their product and some R&D on our part trying to address the very front edge on the networks,” Steve Hawkins, vice president of Raytheon Information Security Solutions (ISS), told Defense Daily in a recent interview.
The technology will monitor where Internet traffic is coming into a major enterprise or operational facility and be able to in real time look at all of the Internet Protocol (IP) based traffic coming in and be able to correlate that across multiple fiber inputs, Hawkins said.
Raytheon ISS tries to identify where it has gaps and then close those gaps with technology, Hawkins added.
“The unique thing here is the interacted solution, making that part of all the other security features we can offer…internal on the networks to the desktop and the end point, all the users, tying that all together in one integrated end-to-end solution,” he added. “This helps us address that very front edge. A lot of people can look at that, but they can’t do it at the full speed of a fiber and furthermore they cannot look across multiple fibers coming into a facility and see if there is a coordinated attack going on, coming in through separate entry points off of the Internet or the telecommunication networks.”
Raytheon selected NarusInsight after a comprehensive review of competing solutions, according to a Raytheon statement.
“We are proud to be selected by Raytheon as part of Narus’ broader strategy to work with the best companies to meet government requirements around the world,” Greg Oslan, Narus president and CEO, said in a statement. “As the foundation for the industry’s most advanced real-time cyber protection, intercept and traffic management solutions, NarusInsight is critical to help meet today’s national security challenges.”
NarusInsight is a passive detection system, Hawkins added.
“If you look at what we are embedding from the Narus perspective…their NarusInsight product…it’s a passive detection. They have the algorithms and the correlation to determine whether it is something bad and to correlate it across multiple networks,” he explained. “What we do is integrate it together with other technologies that can do things like blocking, so you can block [this intrusion] before it gets into your network, or you can even use it passively to determine who that attacker might be, and use other means to [pursue] them.”
Raytheon will be demonstrating some of the capabilities of the technology at the RSA 2009 conference, April 19-24 in San Francisco.
According to Raytheon, Narus has developed and patented state-of-the-art algorithms to detect network anomalies and zero day attacks, and manage unwanted IP traffic.
“We have been pulling together end-to-end capabilities to offer comprehensive solution both in the information assurance and information operations area, both for the government and commercial companies…critical infrastructure players,” Hawkins said.