Damming the data stream

Government and commercial agencies are increasingly turning to content monitoring and filtering products that scan all outbound messages because of concerns that e-mail or instant messaging users may accidentially or maliciously send sensitive data.

Just an emerging market a few years ago, monitoring and filtering products may be all the rage in the next several years, experts and vendors say. That’s because agencies and organizations must contend with new regulations and laws that protect personal, health and financial data.

When an organization first sees how much of its sensitive data it transmits to outsiders, its officials are shocked, said Kurt Shedenhelm, president and chief executive officer of Iowa-based Palisade Systems. Experts say 80 percent to 90 percent of critical data transmitted to unauthorized recipients is accidental.

Palisade provides appliances that scale to a gigabit/sec throughput and show who’s sending what. The company has sold products to local governments, educational institutions and other public-sector institutions. Shedenhelm said the technology helps organization leaders understand information distribution practices and gives them an opportunity to educate its employees about correct business policies.

Richi Jennings, lead analyst for the e-mail security practice at Ferris Research, said two factors will shape the content-filtering market. Laws such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act and agencies including the Securities and Exchange Commission are challenging technology companies to discover better ways to protect Social Security numbers, credit card numbers and other sensitive data from being unknowingly or deliberately disseminated through e-mail messages, instant messages and FTP.

He said there’s also a push in industry, especially from traditional anti-spam filtering companies, such as Symantec and others, to provide a complete solution.

“They suddenly have this kind of blinding flash of inspiration that if we take this spam filter, which is incredibly good at sifting through the text of the message to figure out if it’s spam e-mail, turn that 180 degrees and have it work on outbound mail, we can try to figure out whether these messages are likely to break these regulations that apply to the customer,” Jennings said.

A classic example, he said, is California-based Proofpoint, which provides both technologies. Andres Kohn, Proofpoint’s vice president of product management, said the company provides inbound and outbound filtering and encrypts all outgoing content. In the public sector, he said, customers include state, local and federal agencies, including the Commerce Department, the Library of Congress and a number of national labs.

“When we talk to our customers, they look to a single solution for inbound and outbound e-mail messages,” Kohn said. “We see tremendous growth in the space.”

According to a February Gartner report, content monitoring and filtering is a young market, only about five years old and grossing only $20 million to $25 million in 2005. But the market is forecast to grow to $40 million to $60 million in 2006.

“We expect significant activity during the next few years as some vendors shut down, are acquired or join with others,” the report states.

Matt Pauker, co-founder of Voltage Security, which works with Proofpoint to encrypt data, said customers want a tightly integrated solution that can do everything from monitoring and filtering content to encryption.

In the federal sector, he said, officials realize they need to securely communicate with state and local government officials — especially in situations such as a terrorist attack or natural disaster — who are outside their network.

“There’s a need for a new set of technologies that can provide a safe level of privacy protection and confidentiality with a set of public-sector folks they don’t normally communicate with,” he said.

Jennings said almost all the anti-spam appliance vendors are either working on this or already have add-on products for their existing appliances.