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PUBLISHED MAY 2007 Authors: Bob
Wheeler and Linley
Gwennap
An In-Depth Look at Chips for Network-Security Applications The network-security market remains as dynamic as the threats that are driving its growth. Security-equipment vendors must scale the performance of their VPN/firewall products while adding application-level features. To satisfy enterprise customers, security-software vendors are turning to hardware-accelerated appliances for intrusion prevention (IDS/IPS), antivirus, antispam, and content filtering. The convergence of these hardware and software products is creating Unified Threat Management (UTM) platforms, which have the most demanding processing requirements. For anything above SOHO-class equipment, standard processors alone can no longer deliver the required performance in a cost-effective and power-efficient manner. As a result, security-equipment and -software vendors turned first to accelerators (coprocessors) for encryption and later for content inspection. Today, a new breed of processors is taking integration to the next level by integrating one or more CPUs, memory and I/O controllers, and special-purpose engines for security functions. These integrated security processors are replacing the combination of a standard processor plus accelerator for many new designs. Get Up to Speed Quickly This report covers processors that integrate high-throughput encryption, such as Cavium's Octeon, Raza's XLR/XLS, Freescale’s MPC8572, and SafeNet's SafeXcel-5160. This new edition has been restructured to cover these integrated security processors in greater depth. We also cover IPSec and SSL accelerators from Broadcom, Cavium, Hifn, and SafeNet. In addition, the report examines vendors developing content-inspection accelerators: Tarari, NetLogic, and Sensory Networks. With one report, you can quickly compare the key vendors and their products and accelerate your selection process. This report analyzes each vendor and each product, probing their strengths and weaknesses and presenting key details in a consistent, easy to compare fashion. For example, we have sorted through various performance claims to put all the security processors on a level playing field, showing who can deliver real system throughput. We also tell you who can really do packet processing and who is just pretending. Make
Informed Decisions This report is written for:
• Engineers who are designing networking equipment
and need to select a security processor or accelerator.
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A
Guide to Security Processors and Accelerators,
Sixth Edition
