Thats true…But I believe SaaS is still a lot much of hype than what is really around. Security, SLAs and Data Protection Agreement around SaaS still need to mature a lot. Every week, you get to hear new data breaches. You can afford press F8 and skip reading the licensing and terms & conditions while getting your biz app installed in-house…But you cant afford to do that while signing for SaaS (both S for Security & Software). One may argue that SaaS gives you same level of security as in an internal data center. But it will never be that a target for attackers when its in the cloud.

Chris,

You have a great point here, which I too have experienced while talking to customers. Its really hard to change the 15 year old perception that ‘todays Firewalls are doing what they are supposed to do’ – though security landscape have taken a 360 degree change. It would be wiser to approach the industry with a different punch line ‘We need something different’ and need to give some better names like what you said ‘intelligent gateway guardian’ or ‘Business Protection Gateway’ etc..!

Even then the moment we say this new product ’still’ support NAT and Port blocking you are putting them back to square one on the their perception…

The major innovation IMHO right now is moving a lot of functionality into the cloud in the SaaS model that Tarek mentioned above. Apart from my own company, Perimeter eSecurity is a good example of SaaS solutions for the SME market.

I think the entire UTM space is overdone. Vendors put a lot of effort into piling UTM features on the edge of the network with a big heavy appliance and it turns out a lot of the functionality they thought they were protecting (email, Web apps) is moving into the cloud. The UTM model was a good idea ten years ago, but it seems less customers are actually buying many of the UTM options these days.

After the stateful firewalls. some minor innovations came to life such as Application or Deep Inspection, and later one the UTM’s.
Ok, people may argue that the UTM isn’t a new technology as it is a mix and match of many legacy technologies. But the point is that it offered solution to many problems that legacy firewalls failed to solve, such as identifying port hopping applications (IM’s and P2P) as well as stopping some application layer attacks such as Virii and Spam.

Back to your point, I don’t think the lack of innovations state will last for long, The point is that computers processors are getting cheaper and more powerful and new open source linux-based firewalls and security softwares are now more mature. And that’s why we are going to see zillions of cheap PC-Based firewalls in the coming few days, so the major network security vendors will be forced to offer new technologies in order not to loose the small to medium size enterprise market.

Also in the service providers market they have to focus more on SaaS where S here stands for Security, as these guys are desperate to find new revenue sources. They shall focus now on how to fulfill their MSSP needs (something beyond the Virtual Systems and VDOM’s). Also they shall start to build tools that can give the ISP’s the ability not just to identify P2P traffic, but also to integrate the network security devices with their billing and quota-management systems.

If we saw anything from the innovations at Netscreen (good work by the way, I was a user for many years), it’s that the innovators take the market lead.

Get the features that so many desire at the gateway into one piece of metal, and you will take the market by storm!!

It is my belief that the term firewall needs to be put to rest, and replaced with something to the like of intelligent gateway guardian.

Why people don’t demand innovation is beyond me. But many other market spaces are in the same stagnant state, from Automobile manufacturing, to Zoological gardens. Keep it in the “box” and people will buy – Give them something new and innovative and they will buy in droves!!!