Dell Announces Intent To Acquire SonicWALL 65
New submitter iroc_eater writes with news of an announcement from Dell that it plans to acquire SonicWall, a security services provider.
"SonicWall’s technology detects and protects networks from intrusions and malware attacks, and helps protect data. Dell is buying services and software businesses as the PC market faces competition from smartphones and tablets. Last month, the company hired CA Inc. Chief Executive Officer John Swainson to oversee the software push, and today he said security is an important part of that strategy. 'My goal is to make software a meaningful part of Dell’s overall portfolio, so that means that this is not the last thing you’re going to see from us,' Swainson said."
If you were going to buy a software company....... (Score:2, Interesting)
Why wouldn't you buy a good one? The hotel I stay at for business has a sonicwall firewall, and it isn't the greatest. I can see a lot of vulnerabilities in it; I just don't exploit them.
Re:The Only One I've Seen.. (Score:3, Interesting)
We've got SonicWall at work. Mostly to block Facebook. Except if you use HTTPS, it lets it through.
That took the staff about a week to figure out.
Dude, you've got a well, you've got a problem.
Re:If you were going to buy a software company.... (Score:0, Interesting)
To be fair, half the hotels I've stayed at have had non-working or badly-misconfigured wireless routers. At my last job we had a couple of SonicWALL3060s that worked pretty fucking good, and all of our remote workers had TZ170s, the difference is they were set up by people who knew what the fuck they were doing.
What's even better is not using SonicWALL. Instead use a BSD or Linux box that is configured by 'people who knew what the fuck they were doing'. It's must less expensive and doesn't lock you into their shitty firmware.
Have you ever tried to mesh a bunch of SonicWALLs together? (Oops--time to buy more licenses) Have you ever tried to make a change to lots of SonicWALL devices--like update an ACL? (Oops--not easily scriptable) Have you ever tried to install updates to lots of SonicWALL boxes? (Gotta download a blob that's locked against each devices individual key).
SonicWALL is the king of shitty user interfaces, excessively locked-down equipment, expensive 'addons', and hard-to-manage (script) devices.
Do yourself a favor and use *BSD or Linux. If the CLI (and fwbuilder) scares you, use pfSense.