Kaspersky Systems Management secured first place in the recent Patch Management Solutions Test conducted by the independent laboratory AV-TEST. The test, intended for specialist update administration software, assessed solutions on how effectively they eliminated vulnerabilities and maintained security.
Vulnerabilities in applications pose a threat to businesses as they may be used to bypass a computer’s antivirus protection and infect the entire corporate network. In 2012, Kaspersky Lab found more than 11 million users had at least one vulnerable application on their computers. More than 800 new and already known vulnerabilities were found in legitimate applications such as Adobe Reader, Flash, Oracle Java, etc. This clearly demonstrates that high-quality software management systems are every bit as important as solutions that protect against malicious attacks.
Four products from different vendors participated in the testing by AV-TEST, including Kaspersky Systems Management (paired with Kaspersky Security Center, the solution for corporate IT infrastructure management).
The test assessed several factors: number of applications the solutions supported, how effectively updates for the supported applications were detected, and reaction time between the release of a patch and its availability via the management solution. The latter is particularly important as vendor software updates often patch vulnerabilities that can be exploited by intruders.
The experts also assessed how well the tested solutions disabled integrated tools that automatically update third-party software and how well they blocked the installation of add-ons that often accompany updates and can pose a threat to the security of the computer. The availability of a number of other functions was also compared.
Kaspersky Systems Management was the undisputed leader, demonstrating the best results at every stage of the test. The Kaspersky Lab solution supported more applications than its rivals, detected 98% of the outdated software that was supported, and successfully installed every update and blocked all add-ons.
Timely updates of software on workstations, along with the use of protection solutions, are crucial to a high level of security for any company’s IT infrastructure. We provide reliable protection against all kinds of cyber-threats and offer IT specialists effective tools to administer corporate software. Tests by independent labs such as AV-TEST demonstrate just how well we have developed our technologies,” says Nikolay Grebennikov, Kaspersky Lab’s CTO.
