CA exhorts partners to focus on security incident management

Computer Associates (CA) is working with its solutions partners to get enterprises to realize the importance of deploying
security incident management solutions, with its eTrust suite of products. Though these
products were launched nine months ago, the company was busy evangelizing its concept. It has got two projects under deployment for these solutions
with beta testing undergoing in six other companies. 

CA is already working with tier-one solution partners like Wipro, HCL Ramco, CMC, Rolta India and Tata Infotech who
have an international presence, besides initiating talks with Datacraft for deployment of eTrust product
portfolio. The vendor is also seeking tier-two partners who have a national presence and are focused on security solutions.

CA has a three-tier uniform empowerment strategy for its solution partners. It starts with an appreciation workshop where
partners can familiarize themselves with CA's products and solutions that can be built around it.
They are then given certifications and helped during the actual deployment of the products. "This strategy helps partners understand the products,
decide on how to position it to their customers and finally deploy it," adds Rajendra Dhavale, Consulting Director, CA India.

This is especially true for the eTrust suite, where a lot of customization is required to make the
solution scalable and robust.

According to an IDC India survey, a vast majority of the organizations see security as a technology deployment rather than a
serious business issue. Close to 70% of organization have security coming under their IT department
rather than giving a top management or a risk management drive to it. 

CA is working with solution partners to target corporate who have had their security breached, despite having security
management policies in place. Often these policies are not even implemented. Says Rajendra, "Corporate IT
infrastructures today are often abused despite security vendors coming with various solutions. This is because most networks have a
heterogeneous computing environment and there are very few solutions that can communicate
with all of them."

This has led to the creation of silos of identity stores and access controls, which makes it difficult to manage them. This is why
organizations are left vulnerable to attacks, which is why solution partners should offer
solutions, which will track and eliminate security incidents. CA will work with partners to encourage corporate to develop a security policy that
rotates around definition, execution, update and maintenance. The idea is to hammer home the idea that "More security does not make you more secure,
better management does."

IDC estimates that the security software market in India to grow at a CAGR of 36% until 2008, touching Rs 481 crore, but
lacks awareness in the country. Of this secure content management will grow at a CAGR of 38%,
during this period, up from Rs 46 crore in 2003 to Rs 228 crore in 2008. 

VINITA BHATIA