ISA Server 2006

[Shane Melson]

Looks like I’ll be doing firewall upgrade in my lab this week. Microsoft releases ISA Server 2006!!! Although personally, I’ve been too busy and haven’t done anything with this version or betas, it looks pretty interesting. ISA Server 2006 is an integrated edge security gateway that helps protect your IT environment from Internet-based threats while providing your users with fast and secure remote access to applications and data. ISA 2006 provides various new features and upgrades to its predecessor. Quick overviews of those upgrades are:

Integrated Security:

1. Increase security and deployment flexibility for Web application servers through enhanced multifactor authentication (smartcards, one-time passwords), flexible integration with Active Directory (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol), and customizable forms-based authentication for almost any Web application and client device.
2. Easily integrate ISA Server with your existing authentication infrastructure through enhanced authentication delegation (including NTLM, Kerberos, and SecurID), and gain more access control with improved session management that detects non-user traffic through automatic idle-based timeouts.
3. Maintain secure branch office infrastructure using Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) caching to accelerate the deployment of software updates and keep remote computers protected.
4. Help defend your network with enhanced flood resiliency features for event handling and monitoring that provide better resistance to denial-of-service (DoS) and distributed-denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks.
5. Enhanced attack remediation through comprehensive alert triggers and responses can quickly notify administrators of network problems.

Efficient Management:

1. Simplify the process of securely publishing Exchange, Windows SharePoint Services, and other Web servers with automated wizards for multiple sites and enhanced certificate administration to avoid configuration errors.
2. Web publishing load balancing makes it easy to deploy entire farms of Web servers behind ISA Server deployments using session- and IP-based affinity with automatic out-of-service detection.
3. Easily deploy and configure ISA Servers in branch offices by using answer files on removable media for unattended installation and with automated virtual private network (VPN) wizards to streamline connectivity.
4. Manage remote ISA Servers more effectively with faster propagation of enterprise policies, reduced server requirements, and low-bandwidth optimizations.
5. Log throttling and control of memory consumption and pending Domain Name System (DNS) queries provides enhanced resource control.
6. Unify management and monitoring across your ISA Server infrastructure with the Management Pack for Operations Manager 2005, and use enterprise- and array-level policies to easily control security and access rules across your organization.

Fast, Secure Access:

1. Enable a smoother user experience for published Web applications, document libraries, and content through single sign on and comprehensive link translation to help ensure secure and consistent access.
2. Improve Web page load times and reduce WAN costs for users in branch offices with HTTP traffic compression and caching.
3. Help ensure that the highest priority applications get precedence over other network traffic through DiffServ IP settings, providing better bandwidth utilization and response times for critical Web resources.