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Fortinet Provides Mobile Operators with Industry's First Unified Multi-Layered
Security Agent for Mobile Devices
FortiClient™ Mobile Protects Smart Phones & PDAs Running Windows Mobile®
and Symbian™ OS from Fast-Rising Blended Threats
SUNNYVALE, Calif., June 28, 2006 – Fortinet – the pioneer and leading provider
of multi-threat security solutions – today announced FortiClient Mobile, an integrated
security software agent for Microsoft Windows Mobile and Symbian OS-enabled mobile
smart phones and PDAs.
Extending the capabilities of Fortinet’s FortiClient endpoint security software,
FortiClient Mobile allows mobile operators and handset manufacturers to offer
subscribers increased security. The software is the first mobile endpoint security
solution on the market to integrate full antivirus, MMS/SMS anti-spam, personal
firewall and address book protection and IPSec VPN capabilities to protect mobile
subscribers against constantly evolving and sophisticated mobile threats.
FortiClient Mobile secures the growing number of smart phone subscribers that
leverage standard operating systems such as Windows Mobile and Symbian. These
operating systems provide powerful access to mobile enterprise applications, such
as Microsoft Office Mobile, as well as rich 2.5G and 3G value-add services that
include messaging, web browsing, VoIP and video.
The Stakes are Increasing: Mobile Threats Hit Mainstream
Both mobile carrier value-add services and mobile applications are vulnerable
to an array of security attacks. Doombot, a significant mobile virus attack recognized
last year, provided tangible evidence that mobile devices, smart phones and PDAs
are fast becoming the new frontier of targeted cyber attacks. Doombot, a Denial
of Service (DOS) attack, was developed to infect mobile devices via Web, MMS/SMS
and Bluetooth with the intent to increase battery power consumption and prevent
handset reboot, thereby disabling subscribers from accessing mobile carrier services
and mobile enterprise applications. This not only affected the subscribers’ ability
to access services and applications, but had a strong impact on mobile operator
revenue models as subscriber satisfaction took a dive while call centre traffic
reached new heights.
Evolving Carrier Market Equals Evolving Security Needs
The evolution from proprietary to standard-based mobile handsets is driven by
mobile carriers evolving their service offerings to achieve higher ARPU (Average
Revenue per User) as well as the mobile workforce requirement to access enterprise
applications on the go. With this mobile handset evolution, mobile carriers are
under even more pressure to secure their networks, their investments and the investments
of their subscribers. This additional responsibility requires that mobile carriers
protect against the following:
§ Cyber threats that could compromise mobile phone operating systems and potentially
lead to high tech support costs, subscriber service downtime and issuance of credit,
thus impacting revenue
§ Mobile application viruses that can lead to fraudulent service charges
§ MMS/SMS spam that can lead to phishing scams
§ Vulnerabilities between mobile smart phones to corporate resources, which should
require encryption
“Today’s sophisticated and criminal-oriented blended threats cannot effectively
be combated by yesterday’s point product security technologies, such as the standalone
anti-virus software, that currently resides on millions of mobile phone devices,”
said Freddy Mangum, vice president of product marketing for Fortinet. “Smart mobile
phone devices require a multi-layered and integrated security approach that can
fully protect the mobile subscriber.”
Availability
FortiClient Mobile is available for evaluation on Fortinet.com and will be available
through key mobile carriers and selected phone set manufacturers. FortiClient
Mobile runs on Windows Mobile 5.0 and Symbian OS versions 7.0, 8.0 and 9.0 for
specified smart phones.
About Fortinet (www.fortinet.com)
Fortinet is the pioneer and leading provider of ASIC-accelerated multi-threat
security systems, which are used by enterprises and service providers to increase
their security while reducing total operating costs. Fortinet solutions were built
from the ground up to integrate multiple levels of security protection--including
firewall, antivirus, intrusion prevention, VPN, spyware prevention and antispam--providing
customers a way to protect multiple threats as well as blended threats. Leveraging
a custom ASIC and unified interface, Fortinet solutions offer advanced security
functionality that scales from remote office to chassis-based solutions with integrated
management and reporting. Fortinet solutions have won multiple awards around the
world and are the only security products that are certified eight times over by
the ICSA (firewall, antivirus, IPSec, SSL, IDS, client antivirus detection, cleaning
and antispyware). Fortinet is privately held and based in Sunnyvale, California.
Media Contacts:
David Evans/ Ruth Walters
Cohesive Communications
+44 1291 626200
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Jennifer Leggio
Fortinet, Inc.
+1 408 486 7876
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