The Santa Clara, California-based networking vendor unveiled the three security tie-ups at the Interop show in Las Vegas. They are with IDS/IPS vendor Internet Security Systems Inc, encryption developer CipherOptics Inc and network access control technology provider StillSecure Inc.

With Atlanta, Georgia-based ISS, Extreme has developed an API that passes information between the security vendor’s Proventia range of IDS/IPS appliances and switches running the ExtremeXOS operating system.

An ISS device sitting in a central location can communicate with all the Extreme switches in a LAN, monitoring their flow data for suspicious traffic, which then triggers alert messages that can ultimately lead to a port shutdown.

The deal with CipherOptics, which hails from Raleigh, North Carolina, is an OEM agreement. The security vendor’s data encryption device, which will now be re-branded by Extreme as part of its Sentriant security appliance range, sets up a secure transmission between two or more endpoints. Extreme’s switches will detect traffic requiring encryption – dependent on pre-set policies – and then notify the CipherOptics box to encrypt the traffic.

With Superior, Colorado-based StillSecure, Extreme is rebranding and reselling its agent-less NAC device as the Sentriant Access Guard. Extreme switches will hold unauthenticated users at the switch level while the StillSecure device examines the client machine for security compliance. The Extreme switch will then admit or quarantine the device based on result of the StillSecure NAC device’s scan.

As for the Avaya relationship, this one has been bubbling under for some time, the underlying rationale being that Avaya’s IP telephony together with Extreme’s switches is a match (nay, cheaper alternative…) to Cisco, which of course has both technologies under a single roof.

Now Extreme and Basking Ridge, New Jersey-based Avaya have now put some flesh on the bones, however, unveiling technologies which, they claim, make it easier for businesses to deploy, configure and secure IP phones, switches and other intelligent communication devices used on IP networks.

In particular, they are extending support for open standards to network endpoints, which they say will enable customers to use scalable, multi-vendor solutions for device discovery, authentication, troubleshooting and seamless and automated configuration of network switches and IP phones.

The standards in question are:

-IEEE 802.1AB, a spec that enables devices on a LAN to inform one another automatically about how they are configured;

-the Telephone Industry Association (TIA)-1057, which enables media devices such as IP phones, media gateways and media servers to transmit and receive media-related information, and

-the IEEE 802.1X secure authentication protocol, which protects communications travelling on a converged voice and data network.

The key message here is, of course, that the initiative supports multi-vendor environments rather than end-to-end Cisco ones.