In-depth, high-performing network security products remain crucial to combat the ever-evolving threats to information technology coming in from branch offices and VPNs alike. Firewalls are a definite part of this defense and are often the heart of an overall secure enterprise network.

On top of protecting against denial of service (DoS) attacks, viruses, worms and Trojans (and combinations thereof), a good firewall cannot compromise the network's functions. Even a very powerful firewall will do little if network latency becomes unbearable or slows down business processes.

In today's network security landscape, network management, high bandwidth, and advanced applications (such as unified communications) all factor into the security product decision-making process. Modern networks need security products with ease of management and flexible controls on top of superior intrusion prevention and unified threat management (UTM) capabilities.

One product that fulfills these requirements is the Integrated Security Gateways (ISG) series from Juniper Networks. For the second year in a row, the ISG series has earned a gold medal in SearchNetworking.com's Product Leadership Awards.

Juniper has successfully created an all-in-one multi-gigabit firewall, VPN, and intrusion detection/prevention system that network administrators can manage easily. The fourth-generation, ASIC-based firewall uses GigaScreen3 to map programmable, high-speed microprocessors that support new protocols through software updates. According to Juniper, "No other security solution has the ability to accelerate security processing through software updates."

Product Leadership survey results found that more than 97% of respondents rated the series' ability to block intrusions, attacks and unauthorized network traffic good or excellent. No user said that the firewall protection was less than fair. The application-layer, protocol and HTTP controls received a combined good and excellent rating of 93%, while its ease of management and maintenance was rated good or excellent by 84% of respondents.

Tessa Parmenter, Assistant Editor