Centurion Technologies plans to move to the head of the class next week when it
releases an enterprise version of its remote management technology
and hard drive protection software.
Cornerstone, its newest hard drive protection tool, and
CompuGuard Control Center (CCC), a remote management software for networked
computers, have been largely successful on school, college and university campuses, the company said.
Keith Rickman, vice president of Centurion, said the desktop security
arena has been screaming for assistance to help secure business and publicly
accessed computers, and he believes the company’s latest offerings do just
that.
“There is no one taking this kind of technology into the corporate or
home marketplace,” Rickman said. “No one else is doing this to our
knowledge.”
What is unique about Cornerstone, said Rickman, is that it write-protects the
user’s hard drive from permanent changes. It restores the computer to
the optimal configuration settings established during installation as soon
as the computer is rebooted, rendering spyware and malware powerless.
The leading feature of the product is, according to Rickman, “persistent
storage.” This is an unprotected section of the hard drive where users can
permanently save work they are not able to save to the company’s network.
The security application also accepts advanced remote management commands
from CCC, which is sold separately, allowing network administrators to
register and transfer licenses, automate and customize deployment settings,
and establish auto updates of all Centurion applications.
The CCC technology is based on its predecessor Network Controller/License
Manager (NCLM), which allows administrators to remote enable and
disable protection. Other features include: remote license management and remote user
password management, and it controls Centurion’s other products, such as
DriveShield, MacShield and CenturionGuard.
“School IT administrators have been using NCLM for years and appreciate
the unique features it provides,” Rickman said. “CCC was developed in
response to the feedback we received from our customers using NCLM, and we
are excited to bring this new product to market.”
Tim Derstine, the company’s business development manager, said the jump to the enterprise
market spurred greater demands on developing and improving the technology.
“When we started, the products satisfied the education market,” he said.
“Now we’ve branched off and introduced an enterprise extension of the toolset.”
Pricing for Cornerstone begins at $42 per seat and can drop to $19.75
depending on the volume of licenses. The numbers for CCC range from $200 per
computer managed to $10,400 for a block of up to 5,000 computers.