CloudPassage Introduces Halo GhostPorts SMS

PRESS RELEASE

SAN FRANCISCO – June 12, 2012 – CloudPassage, the leading cloud server security provider, today announces SMS support for GhostPorts, a multi-factor mobile authentication method for its Halo cloud server security platform. GhostPorts SMS provides secure access control for any application on any server in any cloud using any mobile phone as the authentication device, barring the need for any additional authentication infrastructure.

“Secure administrative access to public and hybrid cloud servers is an enormous barrier to cloud adoption., While multi-factor authentication is standard practice for securing servers in private datacenters, until now it has been impossible to deploy it in the cloud without expensive and complex infrastructure,” said Rand Wacker, vice president of product management at CloudPassage. “With Halo GhostPorts SMS, we are eliminating this roadblock with an approach to dynamic network access that is easy to manage and can be implemented quite literally in a matter of minutes.”

For secure server access, Halo GhostPorts SMS generates a one-time passcode that authenticates the user and temporarily opens a server management port for only the IP address the user authenticates from. Used in conjunction with existing server authentication, this broadly accepted process for multi-factor authentication provides outstanding server access control. Visible only to authorized users, the server port remains invisible and inaccessible to would-be hackers, worms, malware and other threats. Since the passcode is delivered via SMS to the user’s mobile device, this approach works on even basic mobile phones and pagers in the United States and internationally.

Halo GhostPorts SMS was specifically built for rapidly securing elastic public and hybrid cloud environments and works on any cloud provider or hosting model, allowing users to secure any cloud server or application. GhostPorts creates dynamic, time-bound firewall rules that open temporary access for authenticated users.

GhostPorts SMS is powered by cloud communications leader Twilio, and was developed with their SMS API. "CloudPassage has built an innovative approach to cloud security,” said Twilio Co-founder and CEO Jeff Lawson. "And Twilio is proud to extend CloudPassges’ capabilities by powering GhostPorts SMS to provide a secure channel that's universal, simple, and flexible.”

“Security must not only be easy for the company, but also for the individual user, which is why we are focusing on the most convenient authentication form possible – the mobile phone,” continued Wacker. “For those companies with a successful BYOD implementation, this model takes advantage of the phones users already carry with them and are comfortable using, providing a simple and cost-effective path to network security.”

Halo GhostPorts SMS can be used with most major Linux and Windows operating systems. Halo GhostPorts also offers an alternative USB key-based approach to two-factor authentication.

Availability

Halo GhostPorts SMS is now available as part of Halo NetSec and Halo Professional. To learn more, and to sign up for the Halo cloud server security platform, visit http://www.cloudpassage.com/ghost.

About CloudPassage CloudPassage is the leading provider of public and private cloud server security and creator of Halo®, the industry's first security and compliance platform purpose-built for elastic cloud environments. Halo operates across public, private and hybrid clouds. Industry-leading companies like Foursquare, Avatar New York and Exois trust Halo to seamlessly manage their server security configuration, host-based firewalls, intrusion detection and server account auditing from one system. A feature-rich version of Halo is available for free at http://www.cloudpassage.com/free. Headquartered in San Francisco, Calif., CloudPassage is backed by Benchmark Capital, Tenaya Capital and other leading investors. For more information, please visit http://www.CloudPassage.com.