The latest Gears update includes the official release of the Gears application, enhanced re-branding capabilities, and new APIs available through the Developer Portal.
The application version of Gears, which was released into beta last month, is now officially available for download. The free tool provides end users with greater visibility into the security state of their device and the status of installed security applications such as antiphishing, firewall, antivirus, unwanted applications, and hard disk encryption. Additionally, the Gears application will highlight if any advanced threats are present on the machine and where they are located on the device.
The application will work without the benefits of having a Gears account; however, additional functionality is available to users that have a fully managed account. Administrators with Gears accounts have the ability to configure several attributes of the application from the cloud-based management dashboard, including determining if the end user can see the application, as well as which anti-malware engines are used to scan the device. To learn more about the additional benefits of registering for a Gears account, click here.
The Gears application also includes the ability to re-skin the application with your organization’s brand. The new re-branding feature allows administrators through the Gears cloud dashboard to customize the end user experience within Gears to display company logos, colors, icons, and translated text. This will provide an organization with a unique method of extending all of the security and compliance enforcement benefits that Gears offers to the end user. All the customization options available for re-branding can be found in the Gears Branding Guide.
We have also added new APIs to our Developer Portal which include an expanded ability to obtain the policy state of a device based on Mac Address, Hardware ID, or SSID, both singularly as well as in batch mode. Additionally, we have added APIs that provide the ability to poll devices for status changes (changes in the policy state) and one that links users to Mac Addresses.
Finally, the Gears release includes the latest OESIS updates for new releases from our partner products including AhnLab, Avira, Check Point, Lumension Security, and TrustPort. Additionally, we have expanded support for the latest version from Bitdefender for hard disk encryption, as well as Firefox 30.x for Windows devices. For a full list of supported applications, please visit our supported applications page.
