Microsoft Partnership with RSA for Information Protection

Microsoft and RSA (now EMC’s security division), have announced a partnership to give companies a better way to protect sensitive information.

We know customers face a lot of challenges trying to strike the right balance between securing information but also giving the right people access and use of it - both inside and outside the company.  Currently, it is often too difficult and expensive to protect data using multiple solutions and policies that have to be stitched together. So, we’re working together on a new “built in” approach (versus additional, “bolted on” technologies) that implements information protection throughout the infrastructure, based on information content and context, as well as the identity of users. 

With this partnership, Microsoft is building RSA’s data loss prevention (DLP) classification technology into our platform and future information protection products.  The goal is to allow customers to define information security policy centrally, push those policies across the enterprise, identity and classify sensitive data, and use various controls to enforce protection.   

Additionally, as a first step, this month the new 6.5 version of RSA’s DLP Suite will integrate with Active Directory Rights Management Services in Windows Server 2008 (AD RMS.)  This means you can automate the application of RMS protection based on the sensitivity of information identified by RSA DLP.   It will facilitate the roll out of RMS by using content-aware discovery to apply RMS access and usage policies. 

We are very excited about this partnership and our new approach to information protection.  It is a good example of our focus on delivering solutions that address security and identity together, knowing that customers Stay tuned for more updates and I encourage you to consider taking advantage of the new integration between RMS and RSA’s DLP solution.