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Affinity Internet and Mazu Networks Form Strategic Alliance
Leading Web Hosting Provider Engages Mazu as Exclusive Provider of Behavioral Network Security Solutions
Cambridge, Mass. and Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. (March 23, 2004) - Mazu Networks, a leading provider of behavioral network security solutions, and Affinity Internet, a leading web hosting services provider, today announced that the two companies have formed a strategic alliance. The arrangement establishes Mazu Networks as Affinity's exclusive provider of behavioral network security systems.
Under the agreement, Affinity will use Mazu's solutions to create a behavioral layer of security covering the company's entire network, from perimeter to core. Affinity is implementing the Mazu Profiler to establish more in-depth and responsive security for the company's critical internal network resources, and by extension, its more than 300,000 customer's valuable Web properties.
This core security will complement the anomaly-based protection Affinity already has in place at its network perimeter through its previous deployment of Mazu Enforcer . With behavioral security capacities spanning its entire network, Affinity will be able to identify, respond to, and avert internal and external attacks – both known and unknown – with speed, accuracy, and efficiency that is unmatched in the Web hosting industry.
In addition to faster and more efficient attack response and recovery, Affinity is utilizing Mazu's solutions to establish a regimen of proactive network security. This involves creation of a capacity for continual visibility into network traffic. It will, for example, help Affinity to establish normal network traffic patterns and usage expectations so that deviations can be quickly identified and dealt with. It also will enable Affinity to identify risk-causing activities, such as unauthorized application usage and rogue services in advance of exploitation and the ensuing damage. Affinity will use this capacity to proactively track who uses which network assets and services, how and when they use them, and usage patterns over time. This will enable Affinity to set, monitor and tighten firewall and network access policies quickly and efficiently.
"Network security is of paramount importance to Affinity and its customers. Through our alliance with Mazu, we reaffirm our long-standing commitment to procure and implement the best available network security solutions to protect our customers," said Peter Chambers, CEO of Affinity Internet. "Among the numerous security products we tested, Mazu's were the most enterprise-ready. They offered the best feature sets for attack protection, and were the only solutions that gave us the proactive security capabilities we wanted. We are very pleased to provide this new and innovative solution to our customers."
"While major enterprise accounts are already adopting these technologies, this relationship signifies the next wave of adoption - service provider delivery," said Jim Melvin, president and CEO of Mazu Networks. "The Affinity team has shown the vision and commitment to customer success necessary to raise the bar in Web hosting services."
Mazu Network's Behavioral Security Solutions
Mazu Networks' behavioral threat protection and network profiling solutions are designed for the large, highly distributed, mission-critical networks run by major corporations and government agencies. Mazu solutions use advanced traffic profiling technologies to create and maintain dynamic models of network traffic and behaviors. Using a combination of traffic profiling and advanced heuristics, Mazu's network security solutions identify and analyze anomalies or deviations from typical behavior.
The Mazu Profiler protects critical applications and services inside corporate and government networks against worms, Trojans, and other zero-day attacks, as well as insider abuse. Mazu's Enforcer solution protects networks at the perimeter from denial-of-service and other bandwidth-based attacks. Using Mazu's solutions, customers significantly reduce downtime and disruption of their key network systems, and greatly improve the efficiency of incident investigation, response and recovery, and network hardening and optimization.
About Affinity Internet
Affinity Internet (www.affinity.com), a web hosting services provider, offers multiple hosting packages, easy-to-use software and e-commerce tools for small and medium sized businesses (SMB). Affinity operates multiple hosting brands (ValueWeb, SkyNetWeb, Bigstep, HostSave and WinSave) offering shared and/or dedicated servers, applications and products to meet specific and growing needs for a segment of the SMB market. By offering a robust network and unparalleled customer service, Affinity provides its customers and resellers with superior service, reliability and scalability.
Affinity has guided over a million businesses to online success. The company is headquartered in Fort Lauderdale, FL with offices in Los Angeles and San Francisco, CA and data centers in Los Angeles and Fort Lauderdale.
About Mazu Networks
Mazu Networks is the first security company to provide real-time insight into enterprise network behavior, reducing the risk, cost and complexity of securing critical network assets and services. The company's real-time traffic modeling technology enables enterprises to profile, plan, and protect networks with unmatched accuracy, efficiency, and scalability. Mazu's solutions eliminate the tradeoffs between security and accessibility, enabling organizations to broaden access to critical applications with less downtime and fewer resources. Mazu Networks is backed by premier venture capital firms, including Greylock, Matrix Partners, Pilot House Ventures Group, and Benchmark Capital. Mazu is an IBM Business Partner. Headquartered in Cambridge, Mass., Mazu also has locations in New York, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.mazunetworks.com or contact the company at www.mazunetworks.com/contact.