MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Nov. 17, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Based on its recent analysis of the network access control (NAC) industry, Frost & Sullivan recognizes Portnox with the 2016 Global Frost & Sullivan Award for Competitive Strategy Innovation and Leadership. The Portnox NAC, a software-based solution, serves mid-sized and enterprise-sized networks by providing them with outstanding NAC that is deployable as NAC-as-a-service (NAC as SaaS) or as on premise software. Using a host of network protocols for beaconing and endpoint discovery, the solution endows network security teams with continuous monitoring capabilities, the contextual awareness needed for network forensics investigations, and the ability to find the root cause of network security incidents.

In addition to the conventional functions of assigning roles and policies to end users and diverting them away from potential threats within a network, the Portnox NAC delivers information about compliance practices, auditing, and reporting. It also provides:

• Endpoint posture assessment, identifying the application software versions, antivirus, patches, OS upgrades, and hard disk encryption on each endpoint
• Complete view of the network, including all infrastructure equipment and endpoints, spotting endpoints missed by other IT or network applications
• Integration with other security tools to find indicators of compromise (IoC)

"One of Portnox NAC's most important value propositions is its ability to be deployed over many different network environments—in traditional 802.11x or non 802.11x networks, as on-premises software, or as a cloud-based service," said Frost & Sullivan Christopher Kissel, senior analyst, IT and Network Security. "The best advantage of NAC as SaaS is the change in licensing term from a yearly subscription model to a monthly monetization model, transforming customers' expenses from CAPEX to OPEX," he concluded.

The Portnox NAC is installed directly onto the network infrastructure via network protocols. Once installed onto Layer 2 infrastructure, it recognizes switches, ports, trunk ports, wireless access controllers, network interface controllers (NIC), firewalls, and servers through standard network protocols.

The most commonly deployed NAC protocol is IEEE 802.1X; however, the 802.1X is not always the most viable option. As a software-based solution, the Portnox NAC has a large number of deployment options. It allows companies to use NAC regardless of their switching environment and without the need for supporting RADIUS servers. The combination of a hardware-free and agnostic approach to 802.1X helps Portnox win clients across diverse markets.

Another vital component of Portnox's service portfolio is the Cloud Lumination of Endpoint, Access and Risk (CLEAR), which is available for purchase as a value-added service. It is an endpoint compliance platform that adds contextual awareness to basic NAC functionality. With CLEAR, a device is first fingerprinted in the NAC and then continuously monitored and given a risk-based score. When CLEAR is added to the Portnox NAC platform, all of the actions in the Portnox NAC, including endpoint identification, risk profiling, and automated access control decisions, can be applied across all levels of the network.

"Portnox NAC can be deployed as an agentless solution, but IT or security teams prefer to have control over bring-your-own-device (BYOD) equipment," noted Kissel. "Therefore, Portnox offers a lightweight proprietary agent technology, AgentP, which can be installed on iOS, Android, Windows, and MAC operating systems."

A crucial benefit of Portnox's software-based architecture is that it is easily deployable. Customers report satisfaction with the visibility offered by even a partial NAC deployment, and they claim that the whole proof-of-concept duration is shorter than what is possible from peers' solutions.

Furthermore, the Portnox software is highly flexible, scalable, and extensible. A single Portnox instance can support 25,000 devices, and if more are needed, the admin must simply purchase virtual machines (VMs). All VMs can be rolled into a single pane of glass, and no additional charges await enterprises that may need separate Portnox appliances based on business units or geography.

For its innovative strategies in strengthening its brand and thereby boosting demand for its products, Frost & Sullivan is pleased to present Portnox with the 2016 Global Frost & Sullivan Award for Competitive Strategy Innovation and Leadership.

Each year, Frost & Sullivan presents this award to a company that has leveraged competitive intelligence to successfully execute a competitive strategy that results in stronger market share, competitive brand positioning, and customer satisfaction.

Frost & Sullivan Best Practices awards recognize companies in a variety of regional and global markets for demonstrating outstanding achievement and superior performance in areas such as leadership, technological innovation, customer service, and strategic product development. Industry analysts compare market participants and measure performance through in-depth interviews, analysis, and extensive secondary research to identify best practices in the industry.

About Portnox

Portnox is a market leader for network access control (NAC) and management solutions for any-sized business or government organization. By spanning the diversity of network technologies and connected devices including IoT, the Portnox agentless platform available as cloud-based or on-premise, allows companies to grow, optimize and evolve their infrastructure while ensuring security and compliance. For almost a decade, Portnox has been providing satisfied customers worldwide with a complete view of device and network visibility that reduces security risk and improves network control.  Portnox has offices in the U.S., the UK and Israel.

About Frost & Sullivan

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Chiara Carella
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