Websense Announces Expanded Defensio Offering

PRESS RELEASE

SAN DIEGO, CA - October 5, 2010 – About 40 percent of Facebook posts contain links and about 10 percent of those posts are either malicious or spam. That puts the average Facebook user one click away from malware a few times each day. And even though individual pages are being targeted, more risk comes from high-volume corporate and celebrity pages. Websense, Inc. (NASDAQ: WBSN), a global leader in unified Web, data and email security, is now offering an expanded suite of Defensio 2.0™ security services for businesses and celebrities. Defensio 2.0 reduces security, productivity, and legal liability risks by analyzing and classifying user-generated content that is posted to corporate and personal Websites, blogs, user forums, and social networking sites.

The technology also enhances the real-time threat intelligence of Websense products, including the industry-leading Websense Web Security Gateway. Defensio, the security eyes and ears of Facebook and the blogging world, analyzes more than 2.5 million comments and tens of millions of URLs weekly. The sweeping Web 2.0 threat detection and analysis conducted by Defensio is then incorporated into all Websense solutions, which are powered by the Advanced Classification Engine™ and the Threatseeker Network. As a result, Websense customers are protected from emerging threats and malicious content before they spread beyond the social Web and are addressed by traditional security offerings. Websense is the only security vendor able to integrate into its security solutions the threat intelligence captured behind the closed doors of private social networks—where many threats first emerge, incubate, and spread.

The Defensio 2.0 service is based on technology acquired in 2009 and is in use today in a free, personal version by more than 25,000 Facebook and blog users. The free personal version is still available, but Websense now offers new specific versions that address the needs of smaller and larger companies and celebrities. The new Defensio 2.0 service version includes automatic removal of unsavory content, whether it is malicious, spam, or even profanity; key for those looking to protect their brand image. This new technology reduces the costly manual burden on marketing and security teams who would previously have to remove each piece of comment spam by hand, and investigate every URL in a comment or post for security threats. “Defensio can benefit customers in many ways,” said Chris Christiansen, program vice president for IDC's Security Products and Services group. “Intelligence captured by Defensio adds to the advanced content analysis that powers the rest of Websense’s email, web, and data security products. By adding this information into its Advanced Classification Engine, Websense goes beyond virus signatures, URL reputation, or categorization to address uncategorized Web content. This real-time analysis of social networks can alert customers to new web threats as they occur.”

Defensio 2.0 Protects Facebook Users Comment spam and malicious links posted to sites that accept user-generated comments continue to grow in concern, but what are businesses doing about it? Not much. In a recent seven-day period, Red Bull, with more than 8 million fans, hosted 195 instances of profanity, 15 malicious links, and 37 spammy links. Celebrities especially fall victim to these exploits and unwittingly help them spread quickly, like recently when Justin Timberlake’s 3.7 million fans were treated to a malicious link on his and 250,000 other walls. Lady Gaga, with close to 19 million fans, recently hosted 1,717 instances of profanity, 372 spammy links, and 93 directly malicious links on her Facebook wall in a single week. Defensio 2.0, the first and only security solution designed to protect pages on social networking sites like Facebook, helps organizations protect their brand reputation and their fans from spam and malicious content on their corporate and celebrity pages. For example, an award-winning MTV VMA musician, a world-class auto manufacturer, and a branch of the U.S. military all protect their Facebook pages and fans with Defensio.

“The Defensio 2.0 technology answers a huge market need, as social networking continues to permeate the consumer and enterprise world,” said Carl Mercier, Websense director of development for social Web security and Defensio founder. “As demand increases, we’re seeing Web 2.0 sites as the channel used most by spammers and malicious attacks. Defensio 2.0 is the only technology that scans and protects user-generated content on social networking sites and corporate blogs—giving users the ability and flexibility to harness the full power of social networking securely and safely.”

Defensio 2.0 is powered by the Websense Advanced Classification Engine and ThreatSeeker Network, providing security for the social Web with more than 1 billion sites analyzed and protected daily.

Defensio 2.0 gathers threat data from social networks, where no other security service can see them, and immediately integrates the data into the real-time threat intelligence of the Websense' Web Security Gateway benefiting all Websense customers. The Websense Web Security Gateway also leverages the security intelligence gathered from the 50 million real-time data-collecting systems of the Websense ThreatSeeker Network and the company’s continuously updated database of millions of classified URLs across more than 90 categories, in more than 50 languages.

The Defensio 2.0 security application for Facebook is immediately available. To download it for free, or to learn more about Defensio 2.0 for Web 2.0 sites, visit www.Defensio.com. To learn about Defensio 2.0 for purchase, visit http://Defensio.com/pricing. To view a video introduction to Defensio 2.0 and its new features, visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSLg-yVXt4I.

About Websense, Inc. Websense, Inc. (NASDAQ: WBSN), a global leader in unified Web, data and email content security solutions, delivers the best security for modern threats at the lowest total cost of ownership to tens of thousands of enterprise, mid-market and small organizations around the world. Distributed through a global network of channel partners and delivered as software, appliance and software-as-a-service (SaaS), Websense content security solutions help organizations leverage new communication, collaboration and Web 2.0 business tools while protecting from advanced persistent threats, preventing the loss of confidential information and enforcing Internet use and security policies. Websense is headquartered in San Diego, Calif. with offices around the world. For more information, visit http://www.websense.com.

Follow Websense on Twitter: www.twitter.com/websense Join the discussion on Facebook: www.facebook.com/websense Websense, the Websense Logo, ThreatSeeker and the YES! Logo are registered trademarks of Websense, Inc. in the United States and/or other countries. Websense has numerous other unregistered trademarks in the United States and internationally. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

Contact: Hally Wax Websense (206) 353.0888 [email protected]