One of the first cloud providers to sign up for the services is expected to be Amazon Web Services (AWS) and, says McAfee, the plan is for the service to combine cloud security certification with automated auditing, remediation and reporting facilities.
The aim of the new McAfee service is to provide higher levels of confidence surrounding cloud security, as well as auditable records for service providers and their client companies, Infosecurity notes.
Commenting on the McAfee service, Christian Christiansen, IDC's vice president of security products and services, said that SaaS vendors have a difficult time convincing prospects that their services are secure and safe.
"However, McAfee's security products and hosted services expertise are well positioned to help SaaS vendors with security problems and customer doubts", he said.
"Through certification and automation, McAfee can enable SaaS growth by pro-actively addressing customer concerns", he added.
According to McAfee, the new cloud security program centers on three main facilities – cloud security certification; automated auditing, remediation and reporting; and increasing security credibility.
McAfee says that it will partner with certification vendors for the first service and, under the auditing service, it will perform automatic and daily security audits, remediation of vulnerabilities and reporting of the security status of their service and network using the McAfee Cloud Secure service.
The gameplan with the third facility is to use McAfee's SECURE technology and trustmark, which appears on more than 80 000 websites worldwide.
Mark Olesen, general manager of McAfee's SaaS operations, said that Cloud Secure is the company's first step toward proactive and comprehensive security certifications and tools for the cloud.
"With the McAfee Cloud Secure program, we are adding peace of mind for those with cloud deployments, helping end users more easily evaluate and select a safe and secure vendor", he added.