McAfee has introduced Total Protection for Server software, a new offering for security and compliance designed to protect mission-critical applications and data on high-transaction servers.

The company said that the new software protects against targeted and insider attacks, and allows only authorised processes and code to run.

According to McAfee, the Total Protection for Server software comprises of application whitelisting, change policy management, and policy auditing functionality that ensures that only authorised processes and applications can run. The package also includes enterprise anti-virus to provide an extra layer of defense by running on-demand scans during off-peak hours on weekends or at night.

The new software, through dynamic application whitelisting, blocks binaries, drivers, Java and scripts on the server. It also ensures that the server is administered in compliance with verified and approved procedures, McAfee said.

In addition, McAfee Total Protection for Server software protects and manages servers across the entire enterprise with the McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator platform, a centralised platform for deployment, management, reporting, and auditing.

Stuart McClure, senior vice president and general manager of risk and compliance at McAfee, said: “Organisations are at risk because they assume their servers are adequately protected. No one wanted to put security software on the server itself because those were mission-critical applications that required the highest performance and availability, and configurations never changed much anyway.

“But as hackers have become more targeted and sophisticated, servers are increasingly becoming targets, prompting us to develop a lightweight solution that preserves application and server performance while ensuring compliance.”