Security Blanket

3:00 PM -- Storage security has come a long way in six months.

When Symantec Corp. (Nasdaq: SYMC) said it would buy Veritas Software Corp. (Nasdaq: VRTS) last December, the combination required some explanation (see Vulnerable Veritas). When Network Appliance Inc. (Nasdaq: NTAP) acquired Decru Inc. today, the reason for the deal was crystal clear (see NetApp Buys Decru).

Its amazing what a few incidents of lost data will do to raise awareness of an issue -- while striking fear into the hearts of storage customers. In making its case for the Decru acquisition, NetApp rattled off a list of companies that have had data stolen or lost this year: Ameritrade Holding Corp., Bank of America, ChoicePoint (NYSE: CPS), Citigroup, LexisNexis, and MCI Inc. (Nasdaq: MCIP), and Time Warner Inc. (NYSE: TWX).

Decru is a good fit for NetApp in more ways than just bringing together security and storage, though. Here are some of them:

If there’s a possible sticking point, it’s that Decru’s success at least partly depends on its relationships with NetApp competitors such as EMC Corp. (NYSE: EMC), Hitachi Data Systems (HDS), Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ), and Storage Technology Corp. (StorageTek) (NYSE: STK). These partners have helped push Decru sales until now. Will they continue to do so? Probably. "Coopetition" is nothing new among storage vendors. For instance, EMC more than doubled sales of VMware within a year after buying that company, and VMware’s major customers include HP and IBM (see EMC Growth Continues and Storage Makes Strange Bedfellows).— Dave Raffo, Senior Editor, Byte and Switch