Dedicated Server Virtualization Firm, VMware, Joins PCI Security Council

November 20th, 2008

Palo Alto, California - (The Hosting News) - November 19, 2008 - Virtualization solutions firm, VMware, Inc., is scheduled to participate in a key standards-setting body protecting payment cardholder data, in addition to launching an initiative to assist with creating retailer and partner compliant IT infrastructures.

By joining the PCI Security Standards Council, VMware will work with the council to evolve the PCI Data Security Standard (DSS) and other payment card data protection standards. This will help those VMware customers in the retail industry who are required to meet these standards to remain compliant while leveraging VMware virtualization. VMware has also launched the VMware Compliance Center Web site, an initiative to help educate merchants and auditors about how to achieve, maintain and demonstrate compliance in virtual environments to meet a number of industry standards, including the PCI DSS.

Bob Russo, general manager of the PCI Security Standards Council remarked, ”The PCI Security Standards Council is committed to helping everyone involved in the payment chain protect consumer payment data. By participating in the standards setting process, VMware demonstrates it is playing an active part in this important end goal.”

The PCI DSS requires merchants and service providers that store, process or transmit customer payment card data to adhere to information security controls and processes that ensure data integrity. More information on the council and the standard can be found at www.pcisecuritystandards.org.

As a participating organization, VMware will now have access to the latest payment card security standards from the council, be able to provide feedback on the standards and become part of a growing community that now includes more than 500 organizations. In an era of increasingly sophisticated attacks on systems, adhering to the PCI DSS represents a significant aspect of an entity’s protection against data criminals. By joining as a participating organization, VMware is adding its voice to the process.

Shekar Ayyar, Vice President of infrastructure alliances, VMware remarked, ”VMware recognizes the importance of compliance to our customers. We are pleased to join the council in order to help customers’ virtualized environments comply with the PCI DSS and other security standards. By working with the council, we are enabling our retail customers to fully leverage the business benefits of virtualization. These include lower capital and operating costs, increased business continuity, strengthened security and improved energy efficiencies, which can all be achieved while enforcing current compliance standards.”

The VMware Compliance Center Web site provides an extensive listing of virtualization compliance solutions from VMware’s technology partners; useful resources for companies, such as white papers and recorded webcasts; and case studies of companies that have successfully passed compliance audits in their VMware environments. The Web site is also useful for companies looking to meet other compliance standards, such as the Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) Act and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).

VMware’s technology partners are working closely with VMware to provide integrated solutions that leverage virtualization to help customers meet compliance standards. Read what technology partners are saying about VMware’s virtualization compliance efforts at www.vmware.com/company/news/releases/compliance_partner.html

The mission of the PCI Security Standards Council is to enhance payment account security by driving education and awareness of PCI security standards.

VMware (NYSE: VMW) provides virtualization solutions from the desktop to the datacenter. Customers of all sizes rely on VMware to reduce capital and operating expenses, ensure business continuity, strengthen security and go green. With 2007 revenues of $1.3 billion, more than 120,000 customers and more than 20,000 partners. VMware is one of the fastest growing public software companies. Headquartered in Palo Alto, California, VMware is majority-owned by EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC).

For further information about PCI Security Standards Council, please visit: www.pcisecuritystandards.org.

To learn more about VMware, please visit: www.vmware.com.

More: continued here

Netphiles Web Hosting Provider, Develops Grant Program

November 20th, 2008

Tallahassee, Florida - (The Hosting News) - November 19, 2008 - Privately held technology corporation, Netphiles, has developed a community-oriented web development grant program, designed to help deserving organizations throughout the Tallahassee area.

Mahmood Haq, President and CEO of Netphiles, Inc. remarked, ”Tallahassee has been good to us for the last ten years and Netphiles owes much of its success to the businesses and organizations in our community. This is our way of giving back.”

With Netphiles Cares, twice each year Netphiles will choose an organization worthy of receiving the web development donation. Netphiles will then assess the primary needs and goals of the organization to create a web presence that will best promote their mission and message.

Each organization awarded with the grant will receive custom website design, development, and hosting worth up to $5,000.

To kick off the program, Netphiles donated a newly redesigned website and hosting to Guardian Ad Litem and Child Advocates II, Inc, charitable organizations in Tallahassee created to aide children through the legal process. The website includes online donation capabilities and a volunteer resource center to help the organizationŽs 300 volunteers.

Jonathan Negrini, Senior Business Consultant at Netphiles added, ”The Netphiles Cares Grant was created not only to give back to our community, but to foster economic growth and development throughout the Big Bend region.”

Based in Tallahassee, Florida, Netphiles is a full-service web development company that helps businesses reach their full web potential through strategic consulting, web design, e-commerce, database integration, content management, systems integration, web marketing, and web hosting. Founded in 1999, and celebrating its 10th anniversary, Netphiles offers both business and technical expertise to help medium to large-size businesses achieve greater profitability and sales through the Internet.

To learn more about the Netphiles Cares Web Development Grant, please visit: www.netphiles.com.

More: continued here

Rackspace Web Hosting Cloud Solution, Powers Pangea Foundation

November 20th, 2008

San Antonio, Texas - (The Hosting News) - November 19, 2008 - Managed web hosting and IT services firm, Rackspace Managed Hosting’s cloud division, Mosso, has been chosen to power non-profit SaaS provider delivering enterprise-class software solutions, Pangea Foundation.

Pangea will leverage the Cloud Sites to provide hosted services to a growing number of its 1,500 non-profit customers. Pangea has been a Rackspace managed hosting customer since early 2007, and also utilizes hosted Exchange mailboxes from Mailtrust, Rackspace’s email hosting division and most recently came to Mosso for assistance in providing online natural disaster support.

Kraig Kuipers, President and CEO, Pangea Foundation noted, ”In addition to using Rackspace’s managed hosting offering to run our mission-critical software applications, we now rely on Cloud Sites during natural disasters to get our 211 sites up fast and to meet the demand that can be caused by unpredictable traffic spikes. Rackspace has indeed created a hosting portfolio to meet all our IT needs with a suite of solutions that provide scalability and reliability at a lower cost.”

After creating the disaster relief software solutions used by 211 San Diego during the 2007 San Diego fires and by 211 Iowa during the 2008 Midwest floods, Pangea quickly realized that cloud computing technologies are the ideal solution for fast-moving conditions associated with natural disasters which require quick set up and the ability to handle huge traffic spikes. As a result, Pangea turned to Rackspace’s cloud hosting solution, Cloud Sites, to instantly deploy software that provided much-needed information to the many victims of Hurricanes Gustav and Ike along the Gulf Coast in August of this year. The solution was simple, easy to set up and affordable, using a cost-effective, pay-as-you-grow pricing model which provided Pangea cost savings when site traffic was low.

Kristin Kuipers, Founder and Director of Programs at Pangea Foundation added, ”When we calculated the time saved by working with Rackspace’s suite of hosting solution offerings, we discovered that we had achieved a 50 percent reduction in total cost of ownership compared to our previous hosting environment. The Cloud Hosting solution from Rackspace has proven to be a key contributor to our success, enabling us to deliver instantly scalable enterprise-class software and IT infrastructure solutions to non-profit organizations.”

Working with leading technology providers such as Rackspace, Qualcomm and Microsoft, Pangea will soon launch ReliefPoint, a web-based software solution that will be offered to disaster relief and crisis management organizations nationwide. Their vision is to transform a predominately ad-hoc, paper-based structure into a robust and infinitely scalable hosted solution that ensures these organizations are prepared to deal with the next disaster - before it happens.

Emil Sayegh, General Manager of Mosso, Rackspace’s Cloud Hosting Division remarked, ”’Nothing is more important to our Cloud Hosting Solution than providing the highest level of scalability for our customers’ environments, when they most need them. Pangea’s services have a time critical component to the local communities and the non-profits who serve them. Our systems are designed to scale whenever our customers, like Pangea Foundation, most need it to scale. It was very satisfying to also see our vision for an integrated IT hosting portfolio providing value to Pangea in their pursuit of such a noble cause.”

In 2000, The Federal Communications Commission reserved the 211 telephone number for information and referral to social- and human-services agencies. First launched by United Way of Metropolitan Atlanta in 1997, 211 is an easy to remember telephone number that connects people with important community services and volunteer opportunities. The implementation of 211 is being spearheaded by United Ways and information and referral agencies in more than 30 states and the District of Columbia. While services offered through 211 vary from community to community, 211 provides callers with information about and referrals to human services for every day needs and in times of crisis.

A 501(c)(3) nonprofit ‘Software-as-a-Service’ provider founded in 1996, Pangea Foundation is the leader in delivering Impact Visualization On Demand to nonprofits of all sizes. Backed by world-class teams of IT experts, security specialists, and technology partners, Pangea Foundation equips more than 1,500 impact-driven nonprofits across America with Web-based Software-as-a-Service that lets organizations clearly visualize and effortlessly communicate the impact of their programs. Nonprofits choose Pangea Foundation for its expertise in creating custom software that automatically fuses live program data with sophisticated visual analytics to deliver a real-time snapshot of their impact-anytime they want it. Through full-service implementation, unlimited support, and high availability IT services, Pangea Foundation delivers rapid time-to-value, flattens infrastructure and support costs, and improves nonprofit business continuity, enabling nonprofits to focus on their mission.

Mosso is the home of Cloud Sites, Cloud Files and Cloud Servers, providing enterprise-grade hosting and storage services. Mosso provides an easily managed interface so that developers, designers and IT managers can deploy reliable web applications quickly and easily as well as a high performance cloud-based storage service. Founded by two Rackspace employees, Mosso is built upon a cross platform, clustered-computing architecture.

Rackspace Hosting delivers computing-as-a-service, integrating the industry’s best technologies into a flexible service offering, making computing more reliable and affordable. A trusted partner to companies of all sizes, Rackspace enables IT departments to be more effective. Rackspace is distinguished by its award-winning Fanatical Support. Rackspace is recognized as one of FORTUNE Magazine’s 100 Best companies to work for in the US, ranking number 32 on the 2008 list. Rackspace’s portfolio of hosted IT services includes managed hosting, email hosting and cloud hosting.

To learn more about the Pangea Foundation, please visit: www.pangeafoundation.org.

For more information about Mosso, please visit: www.mosso.com.

To learn more about Rackspace Managed Hosting, please visit: www.rackspace.com.

More: continued here

Web Hosting Solutions for 2009, Developed by HostNine

November 20th, 2008

Jupiter, Florida - (The Hosting News) - November 19, 2008 - Web hosting provider, HostNine, has pre-launched a new website focused on enhanced customer support, with simplified service level agreements, for its global hosting offering.

HostNine completes a series of updates internally, as part of its global web hosting mandate. HostNine’s new vision for hosting includes standardized hardware, hosting packages, geographical diverse locations, and easy to read service level agreements.

Clients may select 1 of 10 geographical locations and include unlimited storage and bandwidth. In a market that is focused on stack and rack hosting, HostNine is also limiting the number of accounts per geographically diverse server to less than 500. Through this new product launch, the unlimited hosting plans are hoped to bring together reliability, scalability, and global diversity.

Ben Gabler, Operations Manager of HostNine commented, ”The process allows capacity planning and the ability to provide clients with the resources they need to host dynamic applications such as blogs, content management applications, and websites that load quickly.”

According to the company, the foundation for the standardization provides equal quality across all 10 major points of global presences provided by HostNine.

As HostNine prepared for this major shift in business model, it has spent the last 3 months standardizing web hosting servers to a single highly available Quad Core Xeon based processor with 4GB of RAM and RAID based hard drive configuration.

The management team at HostNine reviewed current documents and revised Service Level Agreements to be easily readable and simple to understand.

Mr. Gabler added, ”Our entire management team spent a full day simplifying the language so that existing customers and new customer alike could read and understand our promise in less than 1 minute. In reviewing hundreds of Service Level Agreements, most would require a full team of attorneys to actually understand.”

Since 2006, HostNine has spent time building a reputable customer base and building a strong product set that includes Windows Web Hosting, Linux Web Hosting, Reseller Hosting and an exclusive geographically diverse infrastructure that provides instant setup of websites in 1 of 10 international data centers. By working with major data center providers, hand selecting hardware components, and custom development of a global hosting infrastructure HostNine provides a premium web hosting solution at an affordable price. HostNine is the leader in customer service, technology, and geographically diverse web hosting services.

To learn more, please visit: www.hostnine.com.

More: continued here

Dedicated Hosting Provider, PEER 1’s Server Beach, to Power Natuba Community

November 20th, 2008

San Antonio, Texas - (The Hosting News) - November 20, 2008 - Dedicated server hosting specialist, and PEER 1 subsidiary, ServerBeach, has been selected to power the web hosting and IT infrastructure Natuba’s document and photo share services.

Originally designed as an iPhone focused web site, Natuba is now broadening its reach to support multiple mobile and web platforms. These changes and growth require a reliable and flexible hosting solution that can address the growing demands of its community.

Richard Yoo, Chief Executive Officer of Natuba remarked, ”Our goal is to provide a simple way for people to share their photos and to make this process quick and easy, all based on a stable online environment. In order to achieve this, we needed to rethink our network and hosting needs, which brought us to ServerBeach. The level of service and support is higher than what we found elsewhere, and we feel confident that our hosting and network will continue to grow efficiently with us, as our community of users increases.”

Natuba experienced a seamless transition when it moved its business to ServerBeach in September of this year. Since that move, the Natuba site is processing at speeds nearly 16 times faster than before, meaning users now see their photos appear online almost instantly after uploading from their mobile phones. Natuba, which was created by ServerBeach co-founder Richard Yoo, relies on having a usable, accessible site.

With ServerBeach, its system is fully optimized for posting and viewing of photos that matter the most to people. In the first few weeks working with ServerBeach, the Natuba team has virtually seen no network challenges or any need for technical support outside of the transition.

Richard Yoo, Chief Executive Officer of Natuba added, ”We were excited to see Richard return to his roots here with the ServerBeach family. We are dedicated to working closely with the creative people at Natuba, as with all our customers, to provide all the hosting infrastructure and tools they need to reach their goals and continue experiencing success.”

ServerBeach, a PEER 1 company, specializes in dedicated hosting for businesses of all sizes around North America and the world, and is based in San Antonio Texas. PEER 1 is an online IT infrastructure provider, for more than 10,000 customers. Serving a variety of industries, PEER 1 offers solutions designed to grow through every stage of web commerce, regardless of company size, and ensures customers’ online presence is always fast, always available. PEER 1 delivers highly scalable managed hosting and co-location solutions in addition to dedicated hosting by ServerBeach. Since 1999, PEER 1 has grown to include 15 data centers and 21 points of presence in 17 major cities across North America and Europe. The company’s headquarters are in Vancouver, Canada and the stock is traded on the TSX Venture exchange under the symbol PIX.

Natuba is a Web 2.0 site for Photos that Matter. As a snapshot photo sharing service, Natuba operates on both the web and on mobile phones offering users the ability to view interesting and notable snapshot photos submitted by users. By leveraging both user-submitted content and the group psychology of its users, Natuba allows visitors to see the most interesting and notable photos with ease. Natuba is a project launched in 2008 by the start-up incubator Hush Labs based in Houston, Texas.

To learn more information on Natuba or Hush Labs, please visit: http://www.natuba.com.

For more information about Server Beach, please visit: www.serverbeach.com.

More: continued here

Host Adapter for SAS/SATA, Released by ATTO Technology

November 20th, 2008

Amherst, New York - (The Hosting News) - November 20, 2008 - Storage connectivity and infrastructure solutions for data-intensive computing environments, ATTO, has released its new 6-Gigabit SAS/SATA host adapters, to select OEMs and partners.

Kevin Burbank, Director of product marketing for PMC-Sierra’s Enterprise Storage Division remarked, ”PMC-Sierra continues to deliver industry-leading enterprise storage controllers and complete end-to-end SAS/SATA chipset solutions. The PM8001 Tachyon SPC 6Gb/s SAS controller enables our customers to deliver superior performance and differentiate their solutions with advanced SAS-2 features. We are pleased that PMC-Sierra’s 6Gb/s SAS solutions have helped ATTO get to market quickly with its high-performance family of 6Gb/s SAS/SATA host adapters.”

Leveraging PCI Express 2.0 and 6-Gb SAS speeds, the H608 and H680 deliver the fastest available connection to SAS/SATA storage (up to 8-GB/sec. full-duplex), powering data-intensive IT and digital media applications such as email compliance, tape backup, data warehousing, high-definition video post-production and digital film production.

ATTO’s next-generation ExpressSAS H608 and H680 offer native x8 PCIe 2.0 to 6-Gb SAS/SAS2.0/SATA/SATA II connectivity ensuring compatibility with the latest in SAS and SATA technology. The ExpressSAS H608 offers 8 internal lanes of connectivity and the H680 offers 8 external lanes of connectivity, each providing up to 1200 MB/sec. maximum full-duplex throughput per lane. Available in a true low-profile form factor to fit all physical server environments, ExpressSAS 6-Gb host adapters feature full driver support for Windows, Linux and Macenvironments, and are backwards compatible with 3-Gb SAS and SATA devices. Combining proprietary technologies, management software and superior technical support, ATTO provides the best performance and reliability in the industry.

ExpressSAS 6-Gb host adapters feature ATTO’s exclusive Advanced Data Streaming (ADSTM) Technology, enabling user to achieve the ultimate in I/O performance by controlling the acceleration of large and small blocks of data. This distinctive intelligence helps ensure that 6-Gb SAS/SATA systems are faster, provide better bandwidth utilization, are easier to manage, and improve system robustness.

ATTO’s 6-Gb ExpressSAS products leverage the experience ATTO has gained over 20 years of working closely with OEMs, and utilizes PMC-Sierra’s new PM8001 Tachyon SPC 8×6G 8-port SAS/SATA controller to meet the most demanding performance requirements of data-intensive IT applications including transactional databases, e-mail servers and large server farms.

Tim Klein, President of ATTO Technology added, ”ATTO has reached a major milestone in delivering next-generation products to the market by shipping 6-Gb ExpressSAS products to select OEMs and partners. By utilizing the latest 6-Gb SAS/SATA technology on our next-generation ExpressSAS products, ATTO remains in a position to provide our customers with the highest-performing host adapters. Additionally, by working closely with our OEMs and partners, ATTO is able to ensure a solid foundation of interoperability and optimum application performance upon general availability of the 6-Gb ExpressSAS host adapters.”

ATTO Technology, Inc. is a storage connectivity and infrastructure solution for data-intensive computing environments. ATTO provides a wide range of end-to-end solutions to help customers’better store, manage and deliver their data. With a focus toward markets that require higher performance, ATTO manufactures host adapters, RAID adapters, bridges, RAID storage controllers, virtual tape appliances, and management software. ATTO solutions are based on providing a high level of connectivity to all storage interfaces including SCSI, SATA, Internet SCSI (iSCSI), Gigabit Ethernet, SAS and Fibre Channel. ATTO distributes its products worldwide directly to Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), systems integrators, VARs and authorized distributors. Contact ATTO Technology, Inc. world headquarters, at: 155 CrossPoint Parkway, Amherst, New York 14068; Phone: (716) 691-1999 Fax: (716) 691-9353.

To learn more, please visit: www.attotech.com.

More: continued here

Dedicated Server Intrusion Prevention System, Deployed 3FN

November 20th, 2008

San Jose, California - (The Hosting News) - November 20, 2008 - Dedicated server, colocation and shared web hosting company, 3FN.Net, has launched an enhanced intrusion prevention service operation, in order to provide maximum stability for web hosting services.

The company has developed the utmost stability of its web hosting and has achieved the highest level of web hosting security by integrating intrusion prevention system into all web hosting services.

Dean McToner, 3FN spokesperson remarked, ”We have powered our web hosting with sophisticated intrusion prevention system providing our valuable customers with unexampled stability of all web hosting services. As high quality web hosting can become a key to online business success, the stability and security of web hosting develop into the beneficial web hosting. Our company has achieved such unprecedented security level of web hosting due to enhanced intrusion prevention system that is now implemented to all web hosting services by 3FN. We value our customers and add only the best and proven systems to our web hosting, new intrusion prevention system will become a great addition to our web hosting services.”

With the recent integration of intrusion prevention system Triple Fiber Network is improving the overall stability of its web hosting. The company develops the quality and efficiency of web hosting services by adding ground breaking tools and system. The addition of intrusion prevention system has allowed to take the stability of web hosting on the highest level. Furthermore, new system, which is integrated into 3FN web hosting services, will not only enhance the stability of web hosting but will allow increasing general performance of web hosting services by 3FN.

The US based provider of dedicated servers, shared hosting and collocation hosting services, Triple Fiber Network, 3FN, Inc. is best known for the quality excellence and high reliability of all hosting services provided on a global basis. Triple Fiber Network has a flawless reputation of reliable hosting provider, providing the high-quality and efficiency of all dedicated hosting services within last 10 years. Since that time the company has created one of the most biggest and powerful network of dedicated servers with main datacenter located in Silicon Valley. The Headquarters are located in San Jose, California, the company has also established offices in UK, India, Ukraine and EU. Triple Fiber Network has founded the subdivision called 3FN Marketing - an online pay per click advertising network and webmaster affiliate program. 3FN Marketing offers optimized targeted pay per click advertising for those who want to promote their websites or products and generous revenue shares up to 95% for webmasters. The company provides customers with 24/7/365 support via the toll-free telephone, online chat and ticket system.

To learn more, please visit: www.3fn.net.

More: continued here

7 Dirty Words Every Hosting Customer Should Know

November 20th, 2008

We have talked in the past about taboo topics inside of the web hosting industry before, but right now I am going to share with you something even better than those inside secrets.Here are the top seven dirty web hosting words (and phrases) that every hosting customer should know or be able to define.1.  [...]

More: continued here

Noise Filter: McColo Taken Down

November 20th, 2008

November 19, 2008 — ( <http://www.thewhir.com> WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — Last week, we reported that alleged cyber-crime host McColo went offline last week when its Internet providers dropped their service to it, reducing global spam levels. Here, we scour for reactions across the web.

More: continued here

Wowza Offers Friction Free Flash

November 20th, 2008

November 19, 2008 — ( <http://www.thewhir.com> WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — Last week, Wowza launched “friction free” licensing with its Wowza Media Server Pro Subscription Edition software, a setup designed specifically for CDN, streaming services and hosting providers.

More: continued here