The IPS Makeover

More organizations are deploying next-generation firewalls that include advanced application inspection and content awareness features, including many of the same features they have been they have been getting from old-school intrusion-prevention systems. That overlap has IT security leaders wondering: Do we still need a traditional, single-task IPS?

IPS vendors are rapidly adding new capabilities to make systems more functional and effective, hoping to resuscitate a category that has long been a staple of the IT security arsenal.

The data suggests that the IPS still has relevance, but its hold is fragile. In the 2013 InformationWeek Strategic Security Survey, only 43% of respondents considered IPS to be "highly effective" at securing their organizations. That response rate is down 3 points from the year before. The firewall fared better: 62% rated their firewalls as highly effective in 2013, though that was down from 66% in 2012. While the two systems stop different types of attacks, it's clear that IT groups view the firewall as more efficient than the IPS.

Read the full article in Dark Reading's January Tech Digest.

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