HP Wants Storage to Feel Secure

HP on Monday will update its security product portfolio with new offerings aimed at data protection and compliance in storage environments.

The products include a secure fabric switch, courtesy of Cisco; an encryption kit for tape autoloaders and libraries; integration of the company’s compliance and key management appliances; and a free online security assessment tool.

HP’s announcement will be just one of many from storage vendors next week, as the semiannual Storage Networking World conference gets underway in Orlando, Fla.

Adam Thew, director of marketing for HP’s Nearline Division, said the company’s goal is to provide end-to-end data encryption. “Different customers have different needs,” he said. Some want to secure data when it leaves the system on laptops or backup tapes, while others might want operating system or application-level encryption.

Security, Thew said, has become “one of the top one or two items when talking to customers.” Payment cards, financial services, healthcare and government are some of the biggest areas affected by growing security and compliance demands.

Thew said HP and other companies are engaged in “active work” on encryption key interoperability standards through the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA). The standards should appear early next year, he said. “We recognize that as a real need for customers,” he said.

HP’s new storage security offerings include:

• The HP C-Series MDS 9000 Storage Media Encryption (SME) fabric switch, courtesy of Cisco, which secures data stored on tape drives and virtual tape libraries (VTLs) in a SAN environment. The SME feature is designed to run on the MDS 9000 switch family, offering encryption and key management functionality for legacy tape devices.
• The HP StorageWorks 1/8 G2 & MSL LTO-4 Encryption Kit, which offers small to mid-sized businesses data encryption capabilities. The kit is designed for the HP 1/8 G2 Tape Autoloader and MSL Tape Libraries with LTO-4 tape technology. It generates and retains encryption keys so information remains private in case tapes are lost or stolen.
• HP has also integrated the HP StorageWorks Secure Key Manager (SKM) with the HP Compliance Log Warehouse (CLW) for an end-to-end compliance validation solution for LTO-4 enterprise tape libraries, providing a secure audit trail through features that centralize event log collection and long-term retention.
• The new HP Storage Security Assessment tool, available for free on HP’s Web site, helps customers figure out what their most critical storage security vulnerabilities are.

The MDS 9222i switch combined with the SME LTU is available now, with a list price of $83,500. The HP StorageWorks 1/8 G2 & MSL 2024/4048/8096 LTO-4 Encryption Kit will be available in June, with a list price of $2,500. The Secure Key Manager cluster lists for $100,000 and the Compliance Log Warehouse starts under $125,000. Both are available now.

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