Microsoft delays Stirling security suite

Stirling, which was originally intended to ship in the first half of this year is a combination of Microsoft’s Forefront Client Security, Forefront Security for Exchange Server, Forefront Security for SharePoint, the new Microsoft Internet Security and Acceleration Server (ISA Server), renamed Forefront Threat Management Gateway, and a unified management console.

In a blog posting on the Forefront Team blog, Microsoft’s Identity and Security team said that the Forefront Server Security for Exchange and Threat Management Gateway would be ready by Q4 2009, but that other components the Stirling management console, Forefront Client Security 2.0 and Forefront Security for SharePoint will not be ready until the first half of 2010.

A second public beta – the first was released last March – and a release candidate will ship prior to the final release, said Microsoft.

According to Microsoft, the delay is due to the further development of the firm’s behaviour based technology, the Dynamic Signature Service “to help deliver more comprehensive endpoint protection for zero day attacks”, and efforts to add interoperability with third party solutions, as per customer requests.

In response, we plan to increase our focus on one of the unique features of “Stirling”, Security Assessment Sharing (SAS),” said the blog.

“SAS correlates security events from different Forefront products and third party solutions, enabling administrators to quickly investigate and remediate security events. We will provide information about interoperability partners in the near future.”