Press Release

Telecommunications Industry Executives Agree Enterprise Security Products are Insufficient for Carrier Networks

Results of Analyst-Sponsored Survey Ranks Security as Most Important Consideration When Deploying IP-Based Services

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., - December 19, 2006 Narus, Inc. today announced that the results of a network security survey conducted at the Telecom Industry Forum overwhelmingly point to the fact that enterprise-class security products (such as IDS/ IPS, firewalls, etc.) are by themselves inadequate in protecting carrier-class networks. The survey queried a cross-section of telecom industry executives who agreed that security concerns are paramount as they deploy IP-based services such as VoIP and IPTV. In fact, 100 percent of respondents ranked security as a top concern.

As carriers migrate to IP-based services, they face the challenge of cost-effectively protecting their networks against damage from a new and evolving breed of sophisticated network attacks. This concern was reflected in the survey, which found that 85 percent of respondents felt that today's enterprise-class security appliances lack the technical capabilities to detect a wide enough range of attacks, and 82 percent believe these products do not detect threats early enough to defend carrier-class networks. In addition, the survey highlighted the increasing demand on service providers to furnish 'clean pipes,' with 100 percent of respondents reporting that larger customers are now insisting that they prevent viruses and worms from penetrating their enterprise networks.

"Core infrastructure security has quickly become a top-of-mind issue among today's telecom carriers," said Brian Partridge, senior analyst at Yankee Group. "As carriers launch new IP-based services, they have begun to recognize that their infrastructure is more vulnerable than ever before. Meanwhile, the traditional enterprise-class security products struggle to meet the demands of the largest IP networks in the world. The ideal solution is a scalable security system that is truly comprehensive, yet flexible and modular. This allows carriers to scale to the rigors of securing carrier-class networks, while also extending that umbrella in the form of clean pipes for their customers."
The Yankee Group-sponsored survey also yielded the following data points:

Fifty percent of telecom industry executives are currently offering or are considering offering a managed security service to their customers.
Sixty-three percent of respondents deem a 15-minute, IP-based service interruption as potentially catastrophic to the health of their business.
Fifty-nine percent of respondents still prefer manual mitigation techniques over automated ones when blocking worm and virus threats.

"The delivery of complex multimedia applications, coupled with increasing customer demands for clean pipes have dramatically increased the complexity of securing carrier networks," said Steve Bannerman, vice president of marketing and product management at Narus. "The overwhelming response of the executives surveyed at the Yankee Group Telecom Industry Forum confirms that enterprise security products are deemed insufficient to protect carrier-class networks, and a scalable, next-generation system is required. The NarusInsight Secure Suite has emerged as the recognized leader in this new carrier-class market."

NarusInsight Secure Suite enables carriers to detect attacks, abuse and behavioral anomalies in real time and to direct actions that can prevent security breaches, attack propagation, loss of productivity and network outages. The industry's most state-of-the-art, carrier-class security system, NarusInsight Secure Suite combines high visibility of the network traffic - layer 3 up to layer 7 - with full correlation between all the other elements on the network (such as routers, firewalls or IPS/IDS), across all of the links on the network as well as external storage facilities to access historical data. This total network view of combined traffic visibility and network correlation enables unprecedented accuracy and industry-leading performance. NarusInsight Secure Suite provides the ability to non-intrusively collect and process user traffic in real time, generating statistics on abusive usage patterns and malicious IP traffic.

About Narus, Inc.

Narus is the leader in real-time traffic intelligence for large IP networks, and is the only company that provides security, intercept and traffic management solutions within a single, flexible system. With Narus, service providers, governments and large enterprises around the world can immediately detect, analyze, mitigate and target any unwanted, unwarranted or malicious traffic. Narus provides its customers with complete, real-time insight into all of their IP traffic from the network to the applications. Combined with the ability to enable numerous actions, Narus customers have the ability to take the most appropriate actions quickly.

Narus’ system protects and manages the largest IP networks around the world including AT&T, KT (Korea), KDDI (Japan), Telecom Egypt, Reliance (India), Saudi Telecom, US Cellular and Pakistan Telecom Authority. Narus is headquartered in Mountain View, California with regional offices around the world. For more information, please visit www.narus.com.

Media Contact

Kathleen Shanahan
Boca Communications
T: 415.570.1405