At VMworld 2017, VMware, Inc. announced its breakthrough solution for securing applications running on virtualized or cloud environments – VMware AppDefense. This new security solution leverages the virtual infrastructure to monitor running applications against their intended state, and can detect and automate response to attacks that attempt to manipulate those applications. Additionally, integrations with third-party solutions will enable a partner ecosystem to leverage VMware’s AppDefense unique application visibility and response orchestration.
“The growing frequency and cost of security incidents points to a fundamental flaw in security models that focus solely on chasing threats,” said Tom Corn, senior vice president, security products at VMware. “AppDefense delivers an intent-based security model that focuses on what the applications should do – the known good – rather than what the attackers do – the known bad. We believe it will do for compute, what VMware NSX™ and micro-segmentation did for the network; enable least privilege environments for critical applications.”
Leveraging VMware vSphere gives AppDefense several unique capabilities. First, it’s in a unique position to see rich application context; both run state and provisioned state. Second, it can leverage the hypervisor to create a protected zone from which to store intended state and monitor runtime behavior. Third, it can leverage vSphere and NSX to automate and orchestrate response. The result is that AppDefense can significantly reduce the attack surface, making threat identification and response more efficient, and creating a more agile DevOps-friendly model for security.
“A security model concentrating on appropriate application behavior can help shrink the attack surface and improve the ability to pinpoint real threats,” said Jon Oltsik, senior principal analyst and the founder of ESG’s cybersecurity service. “With this focus on intended state behavior, AppDefense offers a productive alternative to traditional application and endpoint security. In this way, VMware AppDefense is shifting the focus from simply securing the virtual infrastructure, to using vSphere capabilities as creative enhancements to applications and infrastructure security.”
“Signature-based defenses alone are proving to be increasingly ineffective at preventing modern malware threats,” said Christopher Frenz, director of infrastructure and head of security, Interfaith Medical Center. “Effectively combating malware requires a defense in depth approach such as that laid out in the OWASP Anti-Ransomware Guide. Application whitelisting and network segmentation are a key part of any such defense in depth strategy, and are capabilities that VMware AppDefense and NSX help bring to the table.”
