SkyView and Innovatum Formalize Partnership with New Product

May 20, 2008 Alex Woodie

The i OS security professionals at SkyView Partners and Innovatum, a provider of real-time audit change-monitoring software for the i, rolled out a new product this month that builds on collaboration the two companies started last year. The joint offering, called Policy Minder Real Time powered by DataThread, provides organizations with the capability to receive real-time alerts if the security audit journal detects an event that runs contrary to their security policies.

The collaboration between SkyView and Innovatum made news with SkyView’s release of Policy Minder version 1.3 last August. One of the core new features with that release was the publication of an API that allows greater interoperability with third-party products and the capability to tightly integrate third-party products with SkyView’s security policy compliance tool.

Innovatum was the first third-party vendor to tap into the new API with DataThread, its powerful real-time change monitoring solution for the operating system’s audit journal and database. As a result of the integration, companies that owned both Policy Minder and DataThread could hook them together to ensure that nothing untoward was going on with their systems or data objects that went against their security policies–or if there was, that they would be notified immediately.

With this month’s delivery of Policy Minder Real Time powered by DataThread, the two companies have taken the partnership up a notch and provided the integration between the two products as an easy-to-buy and easy-to-install add-on for SkyView’s PolicyMinder software. The new offering should help eliminate any API-level programming required to join the two products.

The two products are a good fit. Policy Minder, which launched two-and-a-half years ago, provides good coverage of i OS’ biggest security trouble spots, such as monitoring passwords, user authorities, security levels, system values, exit points, object and library access, and other variables with settings that can make or break a security audit.

However, Policy Minder was not designed to be a real-time security monitoring tool. The software could tell a customer whether its security policy was being adhered to, and identify system settings that have changed and are no longer in compliance. But many shops would only discover changes following the running of a weekly report.

By incorporating the real-time monitoring capabilities of DataThread, Policy Minder stays ahead of problems that arise with constantly changing production business servers. The add-on gives users granular, real-time coverage of all events that hit the security audit journal’s coverage zones, such as changes to sensitive objects, use of powerful commands, and access of confidential files, among others.

Carol Woodbury, president of SkyView Partners and a former OS/400 security architect with IBM, says the marriage of DataThread and Policy Minder introduces a new dimension of security compliance management.

“Auditors want to know what your policy is, how it’s been implemented on platforms like the System i, and an assurance that regular compliance checking has occurred; that’s why we created SkyView Policy Minder,” she says. “We see Policy Minder Real Time powered by DataThread created by Innovatum as adding a new dimension to the issue of security policy enforcement and are very pleased with its development.”

Policy Minder Real Time powered by DataThread is available now. Pricing was not disclosed. For more information, visit www.skyviewpartners.com or www.innovatum.com.