Enterprise security apps: Best of breed or best of need

09.06.2006
When it comes to certain security technologies forget about best-of-breed. Think best-of-need instead.

Neil MacDonald, an analyst at Stamford, Conn.-based Gartner Inc., said that as security software such as antivirus, antispam and antispyware tools becomes commodities, they may no longer justify the premium pricing associated with specialized technologies.

Instead, he suggested at Gartner's IT Security Summit in Washington, D.C., this week, the time may be right for companies to consider converged products or services that may not always offer best-in-class capabilities for each individual function but are still good enough.

In addition, MacDonald said, as some threats become well understood and the tools to protect against them mature, it makes sense for security groups to hand over management of these tasks to IT operations groups. For example, antivirus tasks could be handled by desktop support teams while patch management is handled by the software distribution group, he said.

Security shouldn't require dozens of point products, MacDonald said. In the future, "I see reduced costs, reduced complexity, better manageability and better integration being collectively better than best-of-breed," he said. "I would look at desktop security, perimeter security, e-mail security and identity and access management products to see if there are opportunities to go with converged solutions that reduce complexity and save money."

Integrated products make sense, depending on how well the combined functions work and how easily they can be managed, said Sven Doersam, desktop security lead at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.