Barracuda Networks, Inc. is a company providing

security" \n\n\nsecurity.txt is a proposed standard for websites' security information that is meant to allow security researchers to easily report security vulnerabilities. The standard prescribes a text file called \"security.txt\" in the well known locat ...

networking Network, networking and networked may refer to: Science and technology * Network theory, the study of graphs as a representation of relations between discrete objects * Network science, an academic field that studies complex networks Mathematic ...

and storage products based on

network appliances Network, networking and networked may refer to: Science and technology * Network theory, the study of graphs as a representation of relations between discrete objects * Network science, an academic field that studies complex networks Mathematics ...

and

cloud services Cloud computing is the on-demand availability of computer system resources, especially data storage (cloud storage) and computing power, without direct active management by the user. Large clouds often have functions distributed over multi ...

. The company's security products include products for protection against

email Electronic mail (email or e-mail) is a method of exchanging messages ("mail") between people using electronic devices. Email was thus conceived as the electronic ( digital) version of, or counterpart to, mail, at a time when "mail" mean ...

web Web most often refers to: * Spider web, a silken structure created by the animal * World Wide Web or the Web, an Internet-based hypertext system Web, WEB, or the Web may also refer to: Computing * WEB, a literate programming system created by ...

surfing, web hackers and

instant messaging Instant messaging (IM) technology is a type of online chat allowing real-time text transmission over the Internet or another computer network. Messages are typically transmitted between two or more parties, when each user inputs text and tri ...

threats such as

spam Spam may refer to: * Spam (food), a canned pork meat product * Spamming, unsolicited or undesired electronic messages ** Email spam, unsolicited, undesired, or illegal email messages ** Messaging spam, spam targeting users of instant messaging ...

spyware Spyware (a portmanteau for spying software) is software with malicious behaviour that aims to gather information about a person or organization and send it to another entity in a way that harms the user—for example, by violating their priv ...

trojans Trojan or Trojans may refer to: * Of or from the ancient city of Troy * Trojan language, the language of the historical Trojans Arts and entertainment Music * ''Les Troyens'' ('The Trojans'), an opera by Berlioz, premiered part 1863, part 189 ...

, and

viruses A virus is a submicroscopic infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of an organism. Viruses infect all life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea. Since Dmitri Ivanovsky's ...

. The company's networking and storage products include

web filtering An Internet filter is software that restricts or controls the content an Internet user is capable to access, especially when utilized to restrict material delivered over the Internet via the Web, Email, or other means. Content-control software d ...

, load balancing,

application delivery Application streaming is a form of on-demand software distribution. In these scenarios, only essential portions of an application's code need to be installed on the computer: while the end user performs actions in the application, the necessary c ...

controllers, message archiving, NG firewalls,

backup In information technology, a backup, or data backup is a copy of computer data taken and stored elsewhere so that it may be used to restore the original after a data loss event. The verb form, referring to the process of doing so, is "back up", ...

services and

data In the pursuit of knowledge, data (; ) is a collection of discrete values that convey information, describing quantity, quality, fact, statistics, other basic units of meaning, or simply sequences of symbols that may be further interpret ...

protection.

History

Barracuda Networks was founded in 2003 by Dean Drako (founding CEO), Michael Perone, and Zach Levow; the company introduced the Barracuda Spam and Virus Firewall in the same year. In 2007 the company moved its headquarters to

Campbell, California Campbell is a city in Santa Clara County, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. As of the 2020 U.S. Census, Campbell's population is 43,959. Campbell is home to the Pruneyard Shopping Center, a sprawling open-air retail complex which was i ...

, and opened an office in

Ann Arbor, Michigan Ann Arbor is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the county seat of Washtenaw County. The 2020 census recorded its population to be 123,851. It is the principal city of the Ann Arbor Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses all ...

. In January 2006, it closed its first outside investment of $40 million from

Sequoia Capital Sequoia Capital is an American venture capital firm. The firm is headquartered in Menlo Park, California, and specializes in seed stage, early stage, and growth stage investments in private companies across technology sectors. , Sequoia's total ...

and

Francisco Partners Francisco Partners is an American private equity firm focused exclusively on investments in technology and technology-enabled services businesses. Founded in August 1999 and based in San Francisco with offices in London and New York City, Francis ...

. On January 29, 2008, Barracuda Networks was sued by

Trend Micro is an American-Japanese multinational cyber security software company with global headquarters in Tokyo, Japan and Irving, Texas, United State.Other regional headquarters and R&D centers are located around East Asia, Southeast Asia, Europe, and ...

over their use of the

open source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized so ...

anti-virus software

Clam AntiVirus Clam AntiVirus (ClamAV) is a free software, cross-platform antimalware toolkit able to detect many types of malware, including viruses. It was developed for Unix and has third party versions available for AIX, BSD, HP-UX, Linux, macOS, OpenVMS, ...

, which Trend Micro claimed to be in violation of their patent on 'anti-virus detection on an SMTP or FTP gateway'. In addition to providing samples of

prior art Prior art (also known as state of the art or background art) is a concept in patent law used to determine the patentability of an invention, in particular whether an invention meets the novelty and the inventive step or non-obviousness criteria ...

in an effort to render Trend Micro's patent invalid, in July 2008 Barracuda launched a countersuit against Trend Micro claiming Trend Micro violated several antivirus patents Barracuda Networks had acquired from IBM. In December 2008, the company launched the BRBL (Barracuda Reputation Block List), its proprietary and dynamic list of known spam servers, for free and public use in blocking spam at the gateway. Soon after opening BRBL many IP addresses got blacklisted without apparent reason and without any technical explanation. As of October 2009, Barracuda had over 85,000 customers. As of November, 2011, Barracuda had more than 130,000 customers. As of January, 2014, Barracuda has more than 150,000 customers worldwide. In 2012, the company became a co-sponsor of the Garmin-Barracuda

UCI ProTour The UCI ProTour was a series of road bicycle races in Europe, Australia and Canada organised by the UCI (International Cycling Union). Created by Hein Verbruggen, former president of the UCI, it comprises a number of 'ProTour' cycling teams, e ...

cycling team and entitlement sponsor of the

2011 Indianapolis 500 The 95th Indianapolis 500 was held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Speedway, Indiana on Sunday May 29, 2011. The race was part of the 2011 IZOD IndyCar Series season. The track opened for practice on May 14 and time trials were held from Ma ...

champion

Bryan Herta Autosport Bryan Herta Autosport is an American auto racing team that competes in the IndyCar Series and the Michelin Pilot Challenge. It is owned by former IndyCar driver Bryan Herta. The team won the 2011 Indianapolis 500 with driver Dan Wheldon. In 2016 ...

in the

IndyCar Series The IndyCar Series, currently known as the NTT IndyCar Series under sponsorship, is the highest class of regional North American open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars in the United States, which has been conducted under the auspices o ...

, with the #98 Lotus driven by

Alex Tagliani Alexandre Tagliani (; born October 18, 1973), nicknamed "Tag", is a Canadian professional racing driver. He competes full-time in the NASCAR Pinty’s Series, driving the No. 18 Chevrolet Camaro for 22 Racing. Tagliani has competed in a variety ...

, who will defend the team's championship. Barracuda Networks expanded its research and development facility in Ann Arbor to a 12,500 square foot office building on Depot Street in 2008. By 2012, the Michigan-based research division had grown to about 180 employees, again outgrowing its space. In June, 2012, Barracuda signed a lease to occupy the 45,000 square foot office complex previously used as the

Borders A border is a geographical boundary. Border, borders, The Border or The Borders may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Film and television * ''Border'' (1997 film), an Indian Hindi-language war film * ''Border'' (2018 Swedish film), ...

headquarters on Maynard St in downtown Ann Arbor. In July 2012, Dean Drako, Barracuda Networks's co-founder, president and CEO since it was founded in 2003, resigned his operating position, remaining on the company's board of directors. At the time of Drako's departure, the company stated it had achieved profitability, a nearly ongoing 30 annual percent growth rate since inception, 150,000 customers worldwide, nearly 1,000 employees, 10 offices, and did business in 80 countries. The company created the office of the CEO as it started a CEO search. In November 2012, long-time EMC executive William "BJ" Jenkins joined the company as president and CEO. Jenkins worked at EMC since 1998 and most recently served as president of EMC's Backup and Recovery Systems (BRS) Division. In November 2013, Barracuda Networks went public on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol CUDA. In March 2015, Barracuda Networks expanded its business to North Asia and was distributed by TriTech Distribution Limited in Hong Kong. In November 2015, Barracuda added new Next Generation Firewall to its firewall family. Barracuda has announced future discontinuation of its Copy and CudaDrive services as of May 2016. In November 2017, private equity firm

Thoma Bravo Thoma Bravo, LP, is an American private equity and growth capital firm with offices in San Francisco, Chicago and Miami. It is known for being particularly active in acquiring software companies and has over $114 billion in assets under manage ...

announced they were taking Barracuda Networks private in a $1.6 billion buyout. In February 2018 Thoma Bravo announced that it has completed the acquisition. In April 2022,

KKR KKR & Co. Inc., also known as Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., is an American global investment company that manages multiple alternative asset classes, including private equity, energy, infrastructure, real estate, credit, and, through its strateg ...

announced the signing of an agreement to purchase Barracuda Networks from Thoma Bravo for about $4 billion, which completed in August that year.

Products

In chronological order: * Email Security Gateway - In October 2003, Barracuda announced its

and

virus A virus is a submicroscopic infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of an organism. Viruses infect all life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea. Since Dmitri Ivanovsk ...

firewall plug-in appliance. In June 2008, Barracuda launched a spam and virus firewall for large enterprises and

ISP An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides services for accessing, using, or participating in the Internet. ISPs can be organized in various forms, such as commercial, community-owned, non-profit, or otherwise private ...

s. * Web Security Gateway - In April 2005, the company introduced its

appliance to prevent spyware and viruses from gathering and transmitting user data, and to control web surfing. * Load balancer ADC - In November 2006, the company introduced a load balancing appliance for high availability distribution of network traffic across multiple servers. * Message Archiver - In July 2007, the company introduced message archiving to index and preserve emails, and to meet legal and regulatory compliance. * SSL VPN & Remote Access - In November 2008, the company launched its

secure sockets layer Transport Layer Security (TLS) is a cryptographic protocol designed to provide communications security over a computer network. The protocol is widely used in applications such as email, instant messaging, and voice over IP, but its use in securi ...

virtual private network A virtual private network (VPN) extends a private network across a public network and enables users to send and receive data across shared or public networks as if their computing devices were directly connected to the private network. The b ...

product to provide secure, clientless, remote access. * Web Application Firewall - Announced in February 2008, for securing

Web applications A web application (or web app) is application software that is accessed using a web browser. Web applications are delivered on the World Wide Web to users with an active network connection. History In earlier computing models like client-serv ...

for large enterprises and to address regulation compliance such as PCI DSS. * Link Balancer - Announced in September 2008, to optimize and aggregate internet connections from different providers, is currently End Of Life. * Barracuda Backup - In November 2008, the company announced a service to back up data in the cloud, including on-site backup with

data deduplication In computing, data deduplication is a technique for eliminating duplicate copies of repeating data. Successful implementation of the technique can improve storage utilization, which may in turn lower capital expenditure by reducing the overall amou ...

and off-site

data replication Replication in computing involves sharing information so as to ensure consistency between redundant resources, such as software or hardware components, to improve reliability, fault-tolerance, or accessibility. Terminology Replication in comp ...

for

disaster recovery Disaster recovery is the process of maintaining or reestablishing vital infrastructure and systems following a natural or human-induced disaster, such as a storm or battle.It employs policies, tools, and procedures. Disaster recovery focuses on ...

. In January 2009, Barracuda added message-level backup for Microsoft Exchange and

Novell GroupWise GroupWise is a messaging and collaboration platform from Micro Focus that supports email, calendaring, personal information management, instant messaging, and document management. The GroupWise platform consists of desktop client software, w ...

, integrating Barracuda Backup Service with Yosemite Backup, formerly Tapeware.PCWorl
Backup Merger Unites Barracuda, Yosemite
/ref> * Web Security Service - In October 2009, in conjunction with its acquisition of Purewire, Barracuda Networks launched the Purewire Web Security Service which is a

software as a service Software as a service (SaaS ) is a software licensing and delivery model in which software is licensed on a subscription basis and is centrally hosted. SaaS is also known as "on-demand software" and Web-based/Web-hosted software. SaaS is co ...

offering for

Web filtering An Internet filter is software that restricts or controls the content an Internet user is capable to access, especially when utilized to restrict material delivered over the Internet via the Web, Email, or other means. Content-control software d ...

, content security, and safe

surfing. * NextGen Firewall - In February 2010, Barracuda announced its NextGen Firewalls to protect enterprise network infrastructures. The firewalls integrate web and email filtering, intrusion prevention, layer 7 application profiling, and

network access control Network access control (NAC) is an approach to computer security that attempts to unify endpoint security technology (such as antivirus, host intrusion prevention, and vulnerability assessment), user or system authentication and network security ...

into one platform that is centrally managed across multiple distributed enterprise network locations. NextGen Firewalls are available as a hardware appliance,

virtual appliance A virtual appliance is a pre-configured virtual machine image, ready to run on a hypervisor; virtual appliances are a subset of the broader class of software appliances. Installation of a software appliance on a virtual machine and packaging that ...

and public cloud instance. The product includes

wide area network A wide area network (WAN) is a telecommunications network that extends over a large geographic area. Wide area networks are often established with leased telecommunication circuits. Businesses, as well as schools and government entities, u ...

traffic optimization. * CudaTel Communication Server (PBX) - in August 2010, Barracuda announced the release of CudaTel, a VOIP

Private branch exchange A business telephone system is a multiline telephone system typically used in business environments, encompassing systems ranging in technology from the key telephone system (KTS) to the private branch exchange (PBX). A business telephone syst ...

designed for IT administrators. CudaTel features

FreeSWITCH FreeSWITCH is free and open-source server software for real-time communication applications, including WebRTC, video, and voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). It runs on Linux, Windows, macOS, and FreeBSD. FreeSWITCH is used to build private bran ...

, an open-source project sponsored by Barracuda Networks. * Copy.com was announced as a

cloud storage Cloud storage is a model of computer data storage in which the digital data is stored in logical pools, said to be on "the cloud". The physical storage spans multiple servers (sometimes in multiple locations), and the physical environment is ty ...

service in February 2013. The service was discontinued on May 1, 2016. * Barracuda Sentinel - In June 2017, Barracuda launched an artificial intelligence service to prevent spear phishing and cyber fraud. * Barracuda Mobile Device Manager end-of-life was announced in December 2017. The free service was launched in 201

Acquisitions

In September 2007, Barracuda Networks acquired NetContinuum, a company providing Application delivery controller, application controllers to secure and manage enterprise

web applications A web application (or web app) is application software that is accessed using a web browser. Web applications are delivered on the World Wide Web to users with an active network connection. History In earlier computing models like client-serv ...

. In November 2008, Barracuda Networks expanded into cloud-based backup services by acquiring BitLeap. In November 2008, Barracuda Networks acquired 3SP, allowing the company to introduce

Secure Sockets Layer Transport Layer Security (TLS) is a cryptographic protocol designed to provide communications security over a computer network. The protocol is widely used in applications such as email, instant messaging, and voice over IP, but its use in securi ...

(SSL)

Virtual Private Network A virtual private network (VPN) extends a private network across a public network and enables users to send and receive data across shared or public networks as if their computing devices were directly connected to the private network. The b ...

(VPN) products to allow secure remote access to network file shares, internal Web sites and remote control capabilities for desktops and servers. In January 2009, Barracuda Networks acquired Yosemite Technologies to add software agents for incremental backups of applications such as

Microsoft Exchange Server Microsoft Exchange Server is a mail server and calendaring server developed by Microsoft. It runs exclusively on Windows Server operating systems. The first version was called Exchange Server 4.0, to position it as the successor to the related ...

and SQL Server, and

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for se ...

system states. September 2009, Barracuda Networks acquired controlling interest in phion AG, an Austria-based public company delivering enterprise-class firewalls. In October 2009, Barracuda Networks acquired Purewire Inc, a

(SaaS) company offering cloud based web filtering and security. In April 2013, Barracuda Networks acquired SignNow. In 2014, Barracuda Networks purchased C2C Systems UK. In October 2015, Barracuda Networks acquired

Intronis Barracuda Networks, Inc. is a company providing security, networking and storage products based on network appliances and cloud services. The company's security products include products for protection against email, web surfing, web hackers ...

. In November 2017, Barracuda purchased Sonian In November 2017, Barracuda announced that it was being acquired by private equity investment firm Thoma Bravo, LLC. In January 2018, Barracuda acquired PhishLine.

Controversies

Security Issue

In January 2013, a backdoor was discovered: "A variety of firewall, VPN, and spam filtering gear sold by Barracuda Networks contains undocumented backdoor accounts that allow people to remotely log in and access sensitive information, researchers with an Austrian security firm have warned." The backdoor was then secured shortly after the announcement.

IP reputation and Emailreg.org

On April 13, 2009, Emailreg.org published a notice clarifying that it is a whitelist of domains that had no impact on Barracuda Blog Lists. April 10, 2010 a blog entry appeared alleging that Barracuda Networks SPAM blocking deliberately targets non-spamming IP addresses and tries to get them to sign up for an email whitelisting service "emailreg.org". In 2019 Emailreg.org announced that it was no longer accepting new customers but would continue services for existing customers until further notice. Emailreg.org discontinued services shortly thereafter and is no longer in operation. As of May 2, 2020 the same warning appears for some IP addresses.

References

External links

* {{Official, https://www.barracuda.com/ American companies established in 2003 Companies based in Campbell, California Networking companies of the United States Networking hardware companies Networking software companies Computer security software companies Telecommunications equipment vendors Service-oriented (business computing) Computer security companies Firewall software Spam filtering Anti-spam Email Content-control software Backup software Deep packet inspection Companies formerly listed on the New York Stock Exchange One-click hosting Private equity portfolio companies Kohlberg Kravis Roberts companies Software companies established in 2003 2003 establishments in California 2013 initial public offerings 2018 mergers and acquisitions 2022 mergers and acquisitions