Sophos Web Appliance v4 available end of March

The easiest Secure Web Gateway with the best protection is getting a lot faster and smarter… and soon!

The team has been working hard over the last several months to deliver a new version of the Sophos Web Appliance so we’re very pleased to announce the roll-out of v4 will get underway at the end of March.

Version 4 brings some of your top requested enhancements:

• Lightning Performance with limitless connections and 3-7x the performance on existing hardware
• Added visibility with a new user activity snapshot and detailed timeline report
• Granular controls over common social web applications like Facebook, Youtube, Twitter and more*

Watch a brief 2-minute video overview of the new performance and enhancements:

Timing and Availability

As usual, existing Sophos Web Appliance customers get this upgrade at no extra charge which will be applied automatically to all Sophos Web Appliances (hardware and virtual) during their regular update window sometime during the first few weeks of April as the roll-out gets underway. No action is required to take advantage of this great new upgrade.

New customer orders shipping at the end of March will include the latest v4 release direct from the factory.

If you’re an existing SWA customer and would like to get early access to a beta release of v4, feel free to contact us a swabeta@sophos.com.

Lightning Performance

With more traffic using HTTPS and more complex sites requesting high numbers of concurrent connections and holding them open persistently, proxy capacity and performance is increasingly important. In version 4 we’ve completely re-architected the proxy engine in the Sophos Web Appliance with a brand-new high-performance proxy that can deliver 3-7x the performance on existing hardware, with no limit on connections. It injects a whole new life into existing hardware or virtual appliance installations.

To get the latest sizing guidelines for the full line of hardware or virtual appliance instances, check our updated product technical specifications:

Added Visibility

For those looking for additional reporting, we’ve got some great new enhancements in that area as well.

We’ve added a new Browse Summary by User Report that shows a user’s web activity over the course of a day, week, or month. It can be accessed easily from the User Report Section.

You also get a new detailed timeline report which allows you to dig deep into the details of what sites a user visited during certain time periods. If you get a complaint about someone surfing inappropriate content on a Friday afternoon, this report will help you identify exactly what sites they visited during a specific time period, including the number of hits to that site and the exact time. This new report is accessed from the “Search” section.

Granular Controls

One request we receive often from customers and partners is for control over features on popular social web applications like Facebook chat or games.

With version 4.1* following shortly on the heels of v4, we’re adding granular social web app controls to do exactly that. You’ll get a set of easy policy controls to disable unwanted features of popular social web applications like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube and more. And you can apply these new controls to individual users or groups along with the rest of your policies.

Here’s a mockup of what that might look like:

More Information

If you’re new to the Sophos Web Appliance, check out our Secure Web Gateway solutions.

The release notes and documentation will be updated as soon as they are published towards the end of March.

As mentioned above, existing Sophos Web Appliance customers get this upgrade at no extra charge which will be applied automatically to all Sophos Web Appliances (hardware and virtual) during their regular update window sometime during the first few weeks of April as the roll-out gets underway. No action is required to take advantage of this great new upgrade.

If you’re an existing SWA customer and would like to get early access to a beta release of v4, feel free to contact us a swabeta@sophos.com.

* Note that v4.1 with social web app control is scheduled to ship within a couple of months of v4.