MessageLabs Raises the Stakes in Fast-Growing Email Security Market.

NEW YORK -- Latest reseller agreement should greatly increase adoption of managed services model over software and appliances and further solidify MessageLabs' industry leading position

MessageLabs, one of the leading providers of managed email security services to businesses worldwide, and IBM Global Services are joining forces to help companies fight the growing financial, legal and technical damages posed by spam, unwanted images and viruses, in email which cost businesses billions of dollars a year.

Acting upon a real and immediate need to solve critical business issues, the companies will offer anti-spam, anti-virus, and image filtering services to businesses worldwide as part of IBM's Managed Security Services, Email Security solutions.

Companies interested in evaluating the solution can request a 30-day trial of the service; more than 90% of companies that trial MessageLabs' services become customers.

IBM will be offering MessageLabs services as part of the company's broader security portfolio that includes intrusion detection, firewall management, anti-virus management, vulnerability scanning and incident management services.

"IBM, working with MessageLabs, can help provide businesses with increased email security for greater productivity and greater peace of mind," said John Suehr, segment executive for managed security services, IBM Global Services.

Last year, Gartner predicted that spam would account for 55 percent of the average enterprise mailbox in 2004, with an increasing amount of it carrying malicious code and scams that direct recipients to a spoofed Web site. To combat this problem--and general email overload, which is now at crisis levels--Gartner recommends enterprise email filtering.(1)

"A number of organizations are using managed services to secure their e-mail systems because they filter out threats at the Internet layer before they reach the enterprise network," said Maurene Caplan Grey, research director at Gartner, Inc. "Such an approach requires no upfront infrastructure investment and can be implemented quickly, which can be particularly attractive when the enterprise wants a problem, such as spam or e-mail malicious code, to be fixed "now."

"IBM's reputation and resources combined with MessageLabs' expertise and services will drive adoption of managed services as the best way to stop email security threats before they ever reach corporate networks," said Jos White, president of MessageLabs Americas. "With financial, technical and resource advantages over desktop or gateway approaches, and the only way to protect against zero-hour viruses, businesses are increasingly adding these services to their overall security posture and loving the results."

MessageLabs' customer base includes a large number of IBM Lotus Notes customers, a synergy that both partners will be able to leverage.

"Air Products has been an IBM and MessageLabs customer for years and we are happy to see the two companies working together. With an end-user network of thousands of employees worldwide, we have benefited from working with both companies," said Joseph J. Surdoval, Manager, IT Client Engineering Services for Air Products and Chemicals, Inc.

"In today's computing environment, multi-faceted threats come from all directions and require a multi-layered security approach. MessageLabs provides us with a critical first-line of defense against threats at the Internet layer and can help shrink the window of vulnerability inherent with desktop and gateway products. We have already realized a return on investment from their services and highly recommend them."

According to the Yankee Group, "Although the need for e-mail content filtering is driven by the sharp increase in spam and Sobig-type viruses, the benefits have not stopped there. Antispam solutions are improving overall network security without adding administrative burden to e-mail or virus teams."

When choosing amongst the different types of email security solutions, Yankee recommends that enterprises use service-based solutions that combine antispam, antivirus and perimeter security and address multiple business goals in one neat package.

The firm also recommends enterprises look for an email security solution that offers added protection for externally accessible e-mail servers, which MessageLabs provides.

"Spammers exploit the open nature of SMTP and bombard e-mail servers with information requests to gather valid e-mail addresses. Some solutions prevent invalid requests from being processed, improving overall security and allowing e-mail servers to process only legitimate e-mail. Organizations that opt for an SMTP relay service that redirects email to the service provider for processing can reconfigure perimeter security devices to only accept e-mail traffic from the service provider." Yankee Report, Enterprises Reap the Benefits of Anti-Spam Solution, December 2003

About MessageLabs

MessageLabs is the leading provider of managed email security services to businesses worldwide. The company currently protects more than 8,500 businesses worldwide from email threats such as viruses, spam and other unwanted content before they reach their networks and without requiring additional hardware or software. Powered by a global network of control towers that currently spans 14 data centers in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, Australia and Hong Kong, MessageLabs scans tens of millions of emails a day on behalf of customers such as The British Government, The Bank of New York, EMI Music, HealthPartners, StorageTek, Air Products and Chemicals, SC Johnson, Conde Nast Publications, Fujitsu and Diageo. For more information on MessageLabs and its industry-leading email security and management services, please visit www.messagelabs.com.

(1)Gartner Report, "E-Mail Overload Soars to Crisis Levels", December 2003