eEye Gives Away Security Software To Consumers

eEye Digital Security will release a free version of its Blink intrusion prevention product to consumers in the next few weeks, a company official said Monday.

"It'll be the same as the enterprise product," said Marc Maiffret, eEye's chief hacking officer. "The consumer market isn't something we [normally] go after, but in 2006 there have been more Microsoft zero-day vulnerabilities than in at any other time. Consumers are getting left hung up to dry."

The Aliso Viejo, Calif. security company sells exclusively to the enterprise and small- and medium-business markets, said Maiffret. "We think its good marketing to get the word out [about Blink Endpoint Intrusion Prevention]," he said.

To be dubbed Blink Personal and available "in the next couple of weeks," the security software will include the same protocol-based intrusion prevention, anti-spyware tools, identity theft defense, and personal firewall as the enterprise-grade version.

eEye's motives aren't completely altruistic: it will collect threat and attack statistics anonymously from the users of Personal. "That will let us fine-tune Blink's rules," said Maiffret. "[Blink essentially] creates a massive honey pot, and consumers adding to that will make the enterprise product better."

The company also plans to upsell users of Blink Personal to a feature-added Professional edition by the end of the year. The for-a-fee version will include a traditional anti-virus scanner; eEye is currently negotiating with an AV scanner engine owner to license it for Blink, but wasn't ready to disclose the provider.

eEye expects to make a formal announcement in August, at which point it will provide the URL for downloading Blink Personal.

"We think it's pretty compelling," concluded Maiffret. "The footprint won't be any more than your existing security suit, plus you get the functionality of being protected from attacks of all kinds."