Rackspace deploys over 22,000 Cisco firewalls
Rackspace is making Cisco’s next-generation firewalls available to customers who need to secure multi-cloud environments.
Cisco and Rackspace’s partnership stretches back nearly 20 years, with Rackspace being recognized as one of Cisco’s largest firewall customers. As Cisco’s testing partner, Rackspace has launched Cisco’s stateful firewall, the ASA series, the ASA 5500-X Series and the Cisco Firepower Next-Generation Firewall.
“The cloud is the future of IT for all businesses, but for many companies, the journey to the cloud can be a challenge,” said Brian Kelly, chief security officer, Rackspace. “One of the biggest hurdles and concerns for these companies is security – customers want to know that their data is protected with the most up-to-date and innovative technologies, even as their cloud needs evolve. Through our close collaboration with Cisco in threat protection, we are committed to helping secure our clients’ evolving and expanding journey to the cloud.”
The news follows Cisco publishings its 2018 Annual Cybersecurity Report, which found security professionals are becoming increasingly reliant on automation, machine learning and artificial intelligence (A.I.). Approximately 39% of security professional involved in the study said they are completely reliant on automation, 34% said they are completely reliant on machine learning, and 32% said they are completely reliant on A.I.
At the same time, the authors of the report found adversaries are increasingly weaponizing cloud services. Workloads moving to the cloud are at risk of creating new threat vectors as well. These vectors can come from the companies’ premises, to the cloud and to threats coming directly from the internet, according to Cisco.
Rackspace said it has deployed over 22,000 Cisco firewalls to provide protection against security threats. Cisco’s next-generation firewalls, according to the company, will thwart more threats, provide additional insight and control over network vulnerabilities, and minimize complexities by consolidating security functions into a single management interface.
“Today’s attacks are multivector. Customers need to have multiple layers of defense to combat sophisticated attacks, and Cisco brings an integrated architectural advantage to the market,” said David Ulevitch, senior vice president and general manager of Cisco’s Security Business Group. “Cisco is committed to helping protect and secure our longtime partner Rackspace and its customers’ cloud environments.”
