Blue Coat Enters the DLP Fray

In a move that failed to surprise many, Blue Coat announced Monday that it has officially entered the data loss prevention (DLP) space.  Given archrival Websense’s acquisition of DLP vendor PortAuthority more than three years ago, some may consider Blue Coat to be the “Johnny-come-lately” of DLP.  While it’s true that Blue Coat is a few years late to the party, the good news for them is that Websense has largely failed to deliver on its original DLP revenue expectations. 

Blue Coat is positioning its DLP offering to compete against the major DLP vendors known for their complexity (Symantec, RSA, McAFee, to name just a few), in a move not unlike GTB Technologies, Palisade Systems and Code Green Technologies.  According to reports, the Blue Coat DLP product is appliance-based and can be deployed in a matter of “hours rather than weeks or months.”  The solution supports fingerprinting of both structured and unstructured data, provides both network and discovery components, but lacks integration of a Blue Coat-provided endpoint solution.  Instead, according to the Blue Coat website, they partner with Code Green Networks to provide endpoint coverage.

Blue Coat has been used to leading the pack, at least when it comes to its renowned ProxySG appliances for web security and WAN optimization.  That landscape is much different in the DLP space as they compete against leading DLP solutions backed by the world’s most recognizable security firms.  With Blue Coat’s customer base of over 60 million users, it will be interesting to see the level of DLP penetration in the coming months.