In October 2014, Symantec announced the availability of Symantec Endpoint Encryption 11.0, its newly consolidated endpoint encryption platform. Symantec Endpoint Encryption 11.0 combines best-of-breed technologies from Symantec’s PGP and GuardianEdge acquisitions into a single console that includes disk and removable media encryption along with reporting and management. To further streamline its endpoint encryption offering, Symantec aligned MSRPs with market expectations across the entire encryption portfolio and simplified licensing. The October 2014 launch laid the foundation for Symantec to add new features and functionality to its Endpoint Encryption offering.
Today, Symantec is proud to announce the introduction of several key features to its new Endpoint Encryption offering. Symantec Endpoint Encryption has expanded management capabilities to native operating system encryption and now includes support for FileVault2 and Opal compliant self-encrypting drives. This is an important step toward better aligning our offering with the endpoint encryption market by providing customers with the freedom to choose whichever encryption platform best meets their needs.
Other key enhancements included in this release are smart card support on UEFI systems for our public sector customers, as well as support for CD/DVD/Blu-ray and support for Device Session Passwords, further enhancing our removable media capabilities for multi-user workstation/kiosk use cases. See the table below for a list of other feature enhancements and their corresponding descriptions.
Feature | Component | Description |
Support for Secondary Drives | Drive Encryption | Enforces automatic encryption of a second drive on a client computer. |
Pre-boot UEFI Internationalization | Drive Encryption | Allows for the drive encryption pre-boot screen to handle characters in international keyboards. |
Device Session Password | Removable Media Encryption | Allows for devices to be shared with another person without having to share a default password with the person receiving the file. The password is automatically deleted when the removable device is removed. |
“User Preference” Encryption | Removable Media Encryption | Provides users with the flexibility to encrypt on their own (not via policy), and to encrypt only selected files. The user chooses to either have new files written to removable devices or automatically encrypt/not encrypt, and can toggle between these options. |
Support for XenServer Hypervisor | Removable Media Encryption | Provides support for an additional Hypervisor (Note: Compatibility with vSphere hypervisor was provided in Endpoint Encryption 11.0.0). |
Policy to Disable Single Sign-On | Symantec Endpoint Encryption – Management Server | Allows administrators who don’t want to use single sign-on to be able to have multiple authentication types be required for users (For example, organizations who want to force the use of additional smart card authentication). |
Administrator Roles | Symantec Endpoint Encryption – Management Server | Adds more granularity to roles – Limited administrator (many administrator functions though unable to decrypt drives) and help desk personnel (recovery assistance). |
Actionable Search | Symantec Endpoint Encryption – Management Server | Allows administrators to click on information in a report to learn more about the item of concern found in the search for information about a computer. Administrators are also able to encrypt/decrypt machines directly from the reports. |
Import/Export Client Admins | Symantec Endpoint Encryption – Management Server | Client administrator information does not need to be entered repeatedly when new MSIs are being built. This change simplifies the user experience by allowing the import and export of older version client MSI to obtain settings and pre-populate data in the new MSI. |
Server Telemetry | Symantec Endpoint Encryption – Management Server | Allows an administrator to opt-in to participate in the Community Quality program. Information about Symantec Endpoint Encryption-Management Server will be shared with Symantec to help with support/product usage information (as input to product requirements, especially for platform support). |
Visit Symantec.com for a free trial of our new Symantec Endpoint Encryption offering.