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Optical firewall to streamline online security

Network security bottlenecks may be a thing of the past in the near future following news that European scientists are developing an online security solution that utilises optical firewalls.

Working in the EU funded WIrespeed Security Domains using Optical Monitoring (WISDOM) project, the scientists say the new system would be able to analyse data on fibre optic networks at speeds of 40 gigabits per second.

During this cycle, optical packet recognition, interrogation and manipulating data streams, incorporating features of parity checking, flag status, and header recognition will all be carried out.

"These photonic firewalls will operate using novel algorithms and protocols, to extract and process wirespeed security information in high capacity multichannel (Tb/s) networks," says the organisation.

"The algorithms will combine the functionality of optical processing with secondary electronic security approaches to introduce new layers of security analysis."

According to Graeme Maxwell, the vice-president for Integration Technologies at CIP Technologies in the UK and a contributor to the WISDOM project, the goal is not to replace but to complement existing online security solutions.

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