November 20, 2001 — (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — UltraDNS Corporation (ultradns.com), a leading directory infrastructure services provider (DISP) announced that a leading infrastructure integrity company, Tripwire, Inc. (tripwire.com) has selected UltraDNS’s Managed DNS Service to host several of its mission-critical Internet domains and support its global e-security services with failsafe, 100 percent guaranteed Domain Name System (DNS) infrastructure.
Tripwire Inc. is a leading provider of data and networking integritysolutions for Global 3000 companies and e-business corporations as well askey public sector organizations. Tripwire is highly recommended as a bestpractice by many security advisory groups. Tripwire is often deployed as apart of a layered security strategy, forming defense in depth. Tripwireenterprise software strategy provides the foundation upon which security,network management and risk management are built. It ensures thatorganizations can be confident in the integrity of all “data at rest” intheir network source, destination and all stops in between. Tripwirecustomers include Intuit, AT&T, Ernst & Young, and the U.S. House ofRepresentatives. Tripwire is headquartered in Portland, Ore., with directoffices in Silicon Valley, Tokyo, Munich, and Paris. The company also hasdistribution relationships in 17 countries around the world.
Tripwire provides electronic security products and services to thousands ofothers customers, and its GuardCentral Web portal provides visitors withbreaking news on physical and cyber security issues and updates. Securityissues were the foremost consideration for Tripwire to select UltraDNS’sManaged DNS Service as an alternative to conventional Internet directoryinfrastructure. UltraDNS’s proprietary directory infrastructure technologyeliminates serious security vulnerabilities typically found in the13-year-old, widely used public domain Berkeley Internet Name Domain (BIND)DNS software, and ultimately, prevents hackers from accessing criticalcorporate information.
“Tripwire can’t afford for our Web sites to be anything less than availableat all times – much less allow them to be compromised. UltraDNS provides adirectory infrastructure for our domains that has proven to be a greatchoice for the Company,” said Jon Speer, IS manager at Tripwire. “In effect,by choosing UltraDNS’s solution we are ensuring our customers guaranteedaccess to the information and services critical to their security.”
Security is one of the biggest problems with the BIND system for managingname directories, according to The SANS Institute, a Bethesda, Marylandcooperative research and education organization. The SANS Institute listsBIND-based domain name servers as the number one Internet security risk.According to SANS, name servers that run BIND aren’t always up-to-date, andmany have security holes. Such improperly configured name servers can give ahacker access to names, IP addresses, and a variety of other critical andsensitive information about internal systems. Since domain name servers arefairly static and typically are not checked frequently, hackers can breakinto a system and the problem usually isn’t noticed until someone from theoutside reports an attack originating from the name server system.
“Tripwire’s decision to depend on UltraDNS’s Managed DNS Servicedemonstrates the need for a secure alternative to BIND,” said Michael Hotz,UltraDNS’s vice president of software development. “Unfortunately, BIND opensource code is the vulnerability that hackers most frequently exploit whentargeting a company’s mission-critical Web-based systems. UltraDNS’sdirectory infrastructure platform frees IS managers from the burden ofchecking domain name servers and getting BIND patches – and gives everyonethe peace of mind that these servers won’t be an open door to the rest of acompany’s data assets.”
