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IronPort C10 Messaging Gateway Appliance

The IronPort C10 has been designed to serve as an email gateway at the network perimeter, sitting behind the firewall and before the groupware server, whether that server is Microsoft Exchange, Lotus Notes or Novell Groupwise, to defend against SMTP threats.

The appliance is rack-mountable and contains two gigabit Ethernet ports. However, the device can be configured to accept and deliver email from a single connection on either port, if you so desire. Multiple IP addresses can be configured on one Ethernet interface, or you can connect one port to your public network and the second to your private network.

Once installed, the appliance is accessible either via a serial cable connection using a terminal emulator, or over Ethernet using an SSH or terminal emulation interface to access the command line.

The C10 provides protection for up to 250 users, using a four-layer email filtering system. The appliance uses Brightmail's anti-spam solution, which uses automated updates and heuristic scanning to tackle spam.

Anti-virus protection comes courtesy of Sophos' anti-virus engine, while reputation filters enable you to identify and block suspicious traffic.

Policy enforcement comes via a content filtering engine, allowing you to block messages based on different requisites, while the product also offers spike protection. Following the four-stage analysis process, verified messages are then forwarded on to the mail server.

Once logged in to the command line, a setup wizard took us through the process of configuring the C10, as well as enabling the web interface.

Operations can be monitored and managed by the command line interface, but a graphical user interface is also available. We found it useful if you want to avoid using the IronPort syntax. The GUI allowed us to monitor inbound and outbound message flow and modify policy lists. Here we could also configure the settings for Brightmail and Sophos integrations.

The appliance offers a variety of logging and reporting options, and offers functionality to push log files to FTP servers or a remote PC.

Product title
IronPort C10 Messaging Gateway Appliance
Product info
Name: IronPort C10 Messaging Gateway Appliance (Appliances 2004) Description: Price: $11,000
Strength
Does what it is designed for well.
Weakness
Core messaging gateway extremely effective, but lacking wider functionality.
Verdict
A messaging gateway perhaps better suited for enterprises which use multiple tools for security, rather than smaller firms seeking an all-round solution.

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