If you subscribe to the ISAserver.org newsletter, you might have noticed Bluecoat bought some advertising space in the January newsletter. I don't have content control over the advertising, and I wasn't even aware of the ad placement until a couple of hours before it was published. However, even if I were aware, I wouldn't want to censor a sponsor who is willing to buy ad space to share his message with potential customers. In fact, I was impressed by how creative and aggressive they were in their attempt to obtain competitive information in their war against the ISA firewall. Competition is good and ends up benefiting the customer.

What does not benefit the customer are what I strongly believe to be false, misleading and possibly fraudulent claims and information. Check out this video advertised in the ISAserver.org newsletter:

http://www.bluecoat.com/downloads/isawebcast.wmv

The introduction is benign enough, and provides basic marketing information about Web proxy servers, covering the security and access control advantages proxy devices can provide. However, when they get into a discussion of the so-called weaknesses of the ISA firewall, they are in my considered opinion blatantly, incontrovertibly, and irreconcilably wrong. Bluecoat's incorrect, and in my opinion, false claims would be laughable if it didn't generate even more anger than humor. Anger from what I apprehend to be Bluecoat's explicit lies and false information regarding the ISA firewall's weaknesses vis a vis the Bluecoat proxy.

For knowledgeable ISA firewall admins, you'll be as shocked as I am. If you're a fledgling or part time ISA firewall admin, the (from my interpretation) prevarications won't be as clear. I promise to provide you the facts, with full technical detail, that counter each of their false assertions, either in the next newsletter, in a full fledged article, or a detailed blog post. I would hate for any of our readers who downloaded the Bluecoat video in good faith, and listened to it in good faith, to be taken advantage of because of what appears to me to be a bald faced attempt by one of our advertisers to parlay a potential customer's ignorance about the ISA firewall platform into a sale.

Please take this as my formal apology to all ISAserver.org members and ISA firewall fans for providing Bluecoat a venue for peddling what I believe to be false and deceptive advertising. We work very hard to run a clean, ethical and professional shop, and in my opinion, Bluecoat hurt our credibility by advertising the video presentation noted in the link above in our newsletter.

I interpret this as an unfortunate lose/lose situation, as Bluecoat doesn't need to use what I see as misrepresentations of the ISA firewall product to demonstrate its own strengths and thus, in my point of view, sullied its own reputation as a credible vendor. Bluecoat has a high quality product that can easily stand on its own merits without making, as I hope to demonstrate to you in the near future, false claims regarding weaknesses in the ISA firewall product.

Tom

DISCUSS THIS POST AT: http://forums.isaserver.org/Roll_up_discussion_link_for_posts_up_to_02-5-2006/m_2002005670/tm.htm

Thomas W Shinder, M.D.
Site: www.isaserver.org
Blog: http://spaces.msn.com/members/drisa/
Book: http://tinyurl.com/3xqb7
MVP -- ISA Firewalls