McAfee on Monday rolled out an refreshed version of its system security manager, ePolicy Orchestrator, that adds features to detect rogue systems and applies security policies to non-compliant machines.

Most security analysts recommend that enterprise must deploy defense-in-depth solutions that account for worms entering the network not through the protected perimeter, but via machines such as remote systems and laptops brought back into the office. ePolicy Orchestrator 3.5 new tools, said Steve Crutchfield, McAfee's director of product marketing, address those security vulnerabilities.

"ePolicy mitigates the risk of rogue systems, which are the heart of today's security problems," Crutchfield said.

ePolicy Orchestrator (ePO) monitors the network for any LAN-based connections, detects which systems are not managed by ePO, and then lets IT set a range of policy-based responses to those that are non-compliant. The responses can range from blocking access entirely to allowing access if, say, the system's anti-virus signatures are up-to-date.

Other additions to ePO 3.5, which is McAfee's centralized manager for all its security wares, including its anti-virus, anti-spam, and intrusion detection technologies, include integration with Microsoft's Active Directory; an expanded set of alerts that can be sent via e-mail, pager, cell phone, or integrated into Security Information System (SIS) consoles; and new support for Linux and Macintosh OS X atop that of Windows and NetWare.

Although McAfee has started to integrate ePO with its Entercept host-based intrusion prevention technology -- this version allows user to launch the Entercept console from within ePO -- the final integration of both consoles won't wrap up until some time in 2005, said Crutchfield.

ePO 3.5 will be available the last week of August from McAfee and its partners.