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SonicWall’s Multi-Cloud Offering Extends to Hyper-V Private Clouds with Flexible Licensing

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Technology and data usage are changing at a rapid pace. Finding a way to store, manage and distribute data is a major challenge. Plus, the need for compute and storage grows at unprecedented rates. You need to buy racks, then hire staff to configure, maintain and monitor appliances.

It’s a no-brainer that cloud adoption is becoming inevitable.

According to a recent study by RightScale, more than 81 percent of enterprises have a multi-cloud strategy in place. Of this group, 51 percent have embraced hybrid cloud environments, while 21 percent use multiple public clouds and 10 percent have various private cloud strategies.

Cloud adoption drives business growth by increasing agility and innovation, while reducing cost. According to Gartner, by 2020 a “No-Cloud” policy will be as rare as a “No-Internet” policy is today. So, you can imagine the importance of secure cloud adoption. It is the future.

Private Cloud Security from SonicWall

In line with this, SonicWall continues to expand its cloud offering with added support of the Microsoft Hyper-V platform on SonicWall Network Security virtual (NSv) firewall series, along with new flexible licensing options. SonicWall also recently announced support for AWS* and Azure platforms.

Hyper-V support is available across the full suite of NSv firewalls. The flexible licensing model introduces a non-perpetual method of licensing your firewalls. Securing data wherever it resides should be consistent and seamless, providing you increased flexibility and an improved security posture.

Do I Need Virtual Firewalls?

While securing the cloud is a must, it is not an easy task. Gartner predicts that through 2020, 95 percent of cloud security failures will be the customer’s fault. And according to Research and Markets, the cloud data center market is expected to reach $67.5 billion by 2023.

With the widespread adoption of virtualization, it becomes increasingly critical to secure workloads and data across your multi-cloud deployment. Virtual firewalls can be deployed quickly, driving productivity and innovation. By being virtual, there is a huge benefit of shifting from CapEx to OpEx models.

Virtual firewalls, like NSv, address some of the critical needs of public cloud security. Below are some of the key benefits of leveraging NSv to protect your public cloud infrastructure and resources.

  • Gain complete visibility into virtual environment for threat prevention
  • Implement proper security zoning and ensure appropriate placement of policies
  • Defend against zero-day vulnerabilities with SonicWall Capture ATP
  • Prevent service disruptions in the virtual ecosystem
  • Gain centralized control and visibility with single-pane-of-glass management via Capture Security Center
  • Leverage agility and scalability without performance impact
  • Maintain security governance, compliance and risk management

Plus, as the threat landscape evolves and takes advantage of various vulnerabilities in the cloud and virtual workloads, it is essential to secure cloud infrastructure. Some of the common type of attacks include cross-virtual machine attacks and side-channel attacks, like PortSmash and Foreshadow.

Virtual firewalls can be used to defend against information threats and protect against unauthorized takeover of virtual machines (VMs). It can provide security at every level of the virtual environment, providing granular security posture control.

What Cloud Platforms do SonicWall Virtual Firewalls Support?

With NSv virtual firewalls you can leverage next-gen firewall capabilities across your multi-cloud deployments. Platform support currently extends to ESXi, Azure, AWS* and Hyper-V*.

How Can I Purchase NSv?

Previously, NSv was available only via perpetual licensing. To solve the challenge of relying just on perpetual model licensing and provide flexibility to our customers, SonicWall introduces non-perpetual licensing for NSv. This is an additional offering to the current SonicWall perpetual licensing model.

SonicWall licensing models provide customers the flexibility to choose perpetual licensing or non-perpetual licensing based on their requirements.

Non-Perpetual Licensing Model

Non-perpetual licensing is ideal for those who require a short-term solution and agile deployments. It’s a single bundle for firewall software, security and support services, making it simple to purchase these appliances. Once the period ends, all services expire at the same time. Customers are notified via MySonicWall before service expiration.

The non-perpetual licensing model is available via the three options: IPS/App Control Subscription, TotalSecure Subscription and TotalSecure Advanced Subscription, which is available over a one-year period.

Service Offering Type Bundled Service
IPS/App Control Subscription NSv Software + IPS + App Control + Support
TotalSecure Subscription NSv Software + CGSS + Support + CSC
TotalSecure Advanced Subscription NSv Software + AGSS + Support + CSC

Perpetual Licensing Model

Perpetual licensing is SonicWall’s traditional licensing model where firewall services do not expire, while security and support services do. Perpetual licensing is suitable to customers that require long-term solutions.

Virtual Firewall Promo: NSa/NSsp with NSv

The SonicWall NSv promo enables organizations to extend the next-gen security of their private data center to the public cloud and ensure end-to-end security of their multi-cloud environment.

Organizations can test drive SonicWall virtual firewalls at no additional cost or commitment to see if it fits their needs and requirements.

  • Test drive an NSv with a TotalSecure subscription for one year at no additional cost
  • Get an NSv TotalSecure subscription with Comprehensive Gateway Security Service (CGSS), Capture Security Center and 24×7 support
  • Requires eligible SonicWall NSa or NSsp firewall with an active AGSS/CGSS subscription
  • Deploy NSv firewalls across public and private cloud platforms, including ESXi, Azure, AWS* and Hyper-V*
GET THE PROMO DETAILS

To take advantage of the SonicWall NSv virtual firewall promo, please contact your dedicated SonicWall SecureFirst partner or reach out to SonicWall online.

What to Look for in a Next-Gen Virtual Firewall

To best capitalize on virtualization trends, IT must operationalize the complete virtualization of computing, networking, storage and security in a systematic way. A new approach is required to select an appropriate and effective next-generation virtual firewall solution. Download our exclusive brief to explore fundamental capabilities, core solution requirements and best practices.

GET THE BRIEF

* Hyper-V and AWS availability pending.

Ransomware Negotiation: How Hackers Target SMBs

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It was a Tuesday afternoon. Liz, a local attorney with 26 years of experience, had given up.

She was easily over 20 hours in to trying to free her computer, with all of her files, from a ransomware attack. She just spent a few thousand dollars on a local IT team to break the encryption and remove the malware. They ultimately couldn’t succeed, but charged $2,000 for their time anyway.

Law enforcement and a local FBI contact both shrugged their shoulders. They only offered sympathy instead of a commitment to investigate. With all of her client files locked, she did what roughly 5 percent of small businesses did this year: contact the hacker via the email address in the ransom note.

Shortly later, a message came through: “Hi, the price to decrypt your files is 1.5 bitcoin.”

With icy fingers, she proceeded to converse with the hacker, via a Russian-based email address, who was going by the name Alkash; possibly an Armenian slang term for “alcoholic.” She began to negotiate with him by acting as an elderly person with little money. She told him she had about $350. His reply was simply, “No.”

She didn’t give up. She replied, “I am supporting my kids and I have to use my computer to earn money. Why are you doing this? Don’t you have family?”

He didn’t bite. He replied, “You live in a rich country. I give you 3 days after which I delete the keys to your files.”

She didn’t flinch. She came back and told him to look at the news on how the government treats the poor and how rich people keep their money to themselves. She said her healthcare was being taken away and she was very sick.

“You own a server with open access,” he said. “Why would a poor sick woman own a server?”

This reveals how she was infected. A lot of us think we are too small to be a target, but in the end, all of us our IP and email addresses that will eventually be found. She had little in the way of security, only endpoint antivirus; an easy target.

She convinced the hacker that she could borrow money from a relative to make it $500. The attacker agreed and instructed her to send a few files that he would unlock as a guarantee he will unlock them all when she pays.

Two days after the initial exchange, Liz was able to buy the right amount of bitcoin from a problematic dealer in South America. She finally unlocked her files.

It was done. Her files were back. She sobbed.

It took around 50 hours to get to this point. Fifty hours of living in fear her client files were gone forever. Fifty hours of lost productivity. Fifty hours of being at the mercy of a thief.

Liz was able to return to work and eventually took time off to recuperate from the attack. Later, while on vacation, she received a call from someone who shared an office with her.

“Are you remotely accessing your computer from your vacation spot?” they said.

The answer was solid: “No!”

Someone, possibly Alkash, was accessing her computer and eventually stole her personal credit card information saved in her browser. She returned from her trip and went right back to work to remediate another breach of her system.

A call to the IT team, a security vendor and the FBI gave her another 20-hour headache, a stack of bills and quotes. Between both attacks, Liz estimated she lost around $50,000 in consultant fees and lost productivity alone.

Feeling like she was getting the run around, Liz called someone she knew at SonicWall. The team went to work to segment her office network and set her up with a firewall. It included the Advanced Gateway Security Suite, which comes with the SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection cloud sandbox service,  to stop known and unknown malware attacks, as well as intrusion attacks, against her server.

So, how are things today?

“Great!” says Liz.

She doesn’t have to worry about follow-on attacks, ransomware attempts and deflating calls to the FBI.

Studies have shown that when a small business is hit with a critical cyber-attack, one in six have to stop business for more than 25 hours. Liz knows the truth to that.

Moreover, roughly 60 percent of small companies that experience a crippling cyber attack are run out of business. A fear that Liz mulled over for 50 hours in June 2017.

To better arm yourself against these forms of cyber attacks, please read our eBook, “How ransomware can hold your business hostage.”