McAfee makes debut in safeguarding business data

McAfee on Monday announced its foray into the increasingly crowded market for products to stop data loss in businesses.

McAfee Data Loss Prevention Host, or DLP Host, is a hardware and software package designed to help companies lessen the chances that their physical and electronic data is at risk of being lost or stolen.

The package consists of software, as well as a server for logging and management that aims to make it easier for security administrators to monitor data activity, compile reports and manage company security policies from a central point. DLP Host also contains features for blocking sensitive data transfer, and providing protection for employees who are working remotely or off their corporate networks.

The protection measures in DLP Host additionally extend beyond strictly electronic data to prevent physical losses of items such as laptops, CDs, USB drives and printed documents.

This marks security veteran McAfee's entry into the data loss market, putting the company into a field that has been until this point dominated by smaller firms like Vontu, Code Green Networks, and GTB Technologies.

The threat of data loss has become increasingly high profile in the wake of headlines about a missing laptop containing U.S. Department of Veterans' Affairs data last summer and now disappearing tapes that belonged to the Internal Revenue Service. While the most prominent data losses thus far have been in the government sector, corporations remain vulnerable as well.

McAfee's release of DLP Host comes amid this week's 16th annual RSA Conference in San Francisco, which started as a small get-together for crypto enthusiasts but has turned into a major event for corporations looking to bolster their security infrastructures.