Maxtor Corporation dons Blue Coat for Web security.

Blue Coat Systems, Inc. (Nasdaq: BCSI), a provider of proxy appliances, today announced that Maxtor Corporation (Nasdaq: MXO), one of the world's top suppliers of hard disk drives and storage solutions, has deployed Blue Coat proxy appliances as an integral component of its worldwide IT security architecture.

Web applications and communications are playing increasingly important roles in Maxtor's worldwide operations. Its website serves as an always-on source for direct sales and product information, software downloads, and support and services for customers, vendors, and partners. Generating $3.8 billion in revenue in 2004, Maxtor has numerous sales and service facilities around the world and employs more than 13,000 people.

Maxtor has deployed Blue Coat ProxySG and ProxyAV appliances at strategic gateway locations throughout its corporate network, wherever there is access to the Internet. The company previously used other forms of intrusion prevention as the primary tools for network security, but found that the addition of Blue Coat products enhanced its comprehensive Web security across the network.

"Blue Coat proxy appliances are an important part of our Web security infrastructure," said Tom Sweeney, IT director for corporate infrastructure at Maxtor. "The Blue Coat ProxySG with Web Filter and ProxyAV appliances help address spyware-related issues and protect against viruses infiltrating our desktops through IM and Web-based back doors. By tackling these problems proactively, Maxtor saves time, money and a lot of manpower in fending off intrusions. Importantly, we've also greatly reduced calls to our help desk regarding network downtime."

Maxtor uses a range of Blue Coat proxies to deploy best-in-class content filtering, spyware prevention, Web virus scanning, IM, and P2P control--while improving bandwidth management and Web performance. These include:

--Proxy for Web Filtering--Maxtor leverages the Blue Coat WebFilter URL list on the ProxySG to set and enforce Web access policies across the enterprise network. By deploying URL filtering from Blue Coat "on-proxy," the company gains a significant Web filtering performance increase while benefiting from a highly relevant and accurate database of more than 8,200,000URLs. Since switching to Blue Coat WebFilter (from a competing URL database), Maxtor has received notably fewer complaints from its users about incorrectly classified URLs.

--Proxy for IM Control--Maxtor has enabled instant messaging control from Blue Coat to prohibit the transferring of files over IM. Blue Coat's I control solution is integrated within the ProxySG appliance to provide Maxtor with comprehensive control, logging, and reporting of all IM traffic. As a result, the company can now control which users are allowed to utilize IM, which IM protocols are allowed, and which features are enabled.

--Proxy for Deployable Web Anti-Virus--ProxyAV provides a Web anti-virus solution that can maintain Maxtor's real-time Web traffic requirements without introducing any noticeable latency. Additionally, ProxyAV and ProxySG are "factory-integrated," so deployment was easy and very reliable. The solution quickly and intelligently processes Web objects to determine which should be scanned.

"Maxtor is a great example of a global market leader tapping into the power of a proxy-based architecture for comprehensive Web security," said Steve Mullaney, vice president of marketing for Blue Coat Systems. "Blue Coat proxy appliances provide visibility and control over Web use and applications and, unlike any other network element, do that while substantially improving application performance."

Fueled by the "webification" of corporate applications and the increasingly strategic role the Internet serves within enterprise infrastructures, the need for better visibility into application traffic to provide the required levels of performance, security, and management has never been more critical--or more challenging. Proxy appliances are rapidly emerging as the foundation for enabling organizations to meet these requirements. By integrating security and acceleration functions into a single platform, Blue Coat proxy appliances represent the ideal solution for ensuring protection, control, and performance of Web-based applications and services.