SonicWALL Launches Premium Editions of Content Filtering Service

New Government/Education and Business Editions Boost CFS Offerings

HostReview.com
Monday, November 17, 2003; 12:00 AM

SUNNYVALE, CA - November 17, 2003 - SonicWALL, Inc. (NASDAQ: SNWL), a leading provider of integrated Internet security solutions, announced today the launch of a significantly expanded Content Filtering Service. Dubbed "CFS Premium," the service is now available in both a Government/Education (Gov/Ed) and Business edition. The CFS Premium Editions broaden the current scope of the well-known CFS Standard Edition, increasing the number of filtered categories from 12 to 56, while at the same time enhancing the policy-setting granularity network administrators can enforce.

"Schools concerned with meeting CIPA (Children's Internet Protection Act) requirements will enthusiastically greet the expanded filtering categories in CFS Premium," commented Jeff Wilson, Infonetics Research principal analyst, VPNs and Security. "More importantly, the ability to enforce customized filtering policies—with differences between students and teachers, or between age groups of students—means administrators have exceptional control over what students encounter on the Internet while still allowing appropriate research and study online."

Recognizing the financial burdens faced by many schools, SonicWALL's Gov/Ed edition bundles each educational institution's CFS Premium purchase with free ViewPoint reporting software, which gives administrators instant insight into their network security and productivity through easy-to-understand, real-time, and historical reports. ViewPoint helps education network administrators by providing summaries of network attacks, network bandwidth utilization, and reports on user behavior.

Users of the CFS Premium Business Edition gain the ability to block not just sites displaying inappropriate content, but productivity draining websites as well. "Content filtering is far more than keeping children safe from pornography," noted Matt Medeiros, president and CEO of SonicWALL. "Businesses of every size are looking for effective ways to improve productivity. Optimizing their bandwidth by limiting access to bandwidth-hogging or districting applications like Internet radio is one way. Filtering out websites with inappropriate content can also limit their exposure to hostile work environment lawsuits."

SonicWALL CFS Premium Editions run on the recently announced SonicOS Enhanced operating system. SonicOS Enhanced currently ships on the new high performance PRO 4060, and is available as an upgrade to the new PRO 3060 and TZ 170 platforms. Customers using other versions of SonicOS or previous operating systems will continue to use CFS Standard Edition.

SonicWALL Content Filtering Service employs an innovative rating architecture utilizing a dynamic database of URLs, IP addresses, and domains to block multiple categories of objectionable and productivity-draining Web content. At the core is a new website caching engine that stores URL ratings locally on the SonicWALL appliance, reducing response time to frequently-visited sites to a fraction of a second. By not requiring a dedicated server for content filtering software and the website database, this unique architecture reduces the cost of ownership associated with competing Web filtering solutions. SonicWALL CFS Premium Editions combine appliance-based policy enforcement and a hosted ratings database to deliver comprehensive content filtering in a cost-effective, manageable solution.

Content Filtering Service Premium Editions
- Filter against 56 categories to provide increased productivity and protection from inappropriate websites, and protection from potential legal liabilities
- Custom User and Group Policies enable customers to create granular filtering policies specific to the needs of business or education users
- Dynamic rating of websites constantly updates the database of over 4.3 million websites to keep current with new and constantly changing Internet domains
- Manage network bandwidth prioritization and allocation to maximize Internet connectivity for company or school use
Content Filtering Service Standard
- Filters against 12 categories that give business and education customers protection from categories such as pornography, hate, violence, and gambling
- Leverages a database of over 4.3 million websites
- Creates a global filtering policy across the entire organization to enforce compliance with business or education Internet usage policies
Pricing and Availability
SonicWALL Content Filtering Service is available now on all SonicWALL integrated security appliances as a yearly subscription service. The new Premium Business Edition is available on the PRO 3060 and PRO 4060 for $1,495 a year and on the TZ 170 for $995 a year. The new Government/Education Edition is available for $1,095 a year on the PRO 3060 and $795 a year on the TZ 170. The Standard version of SonicWALL Content Filtering Service is available on all SonicWALL appliances and ranges from $75 - $995 a year.

About SonicWALL, Inc.
SonicWALL, Inc. is a leading provider of integrated network security, identity, mobility, and productivity solutions for the SMB, enterprise, e-commerce, education, healthcare, retail/point-of-sale, and government markets. Core technologies include firewall, VPN, SSL, high availability, anti-virus, and content filtering, along with award-winning security management solutions. Together, these products and technologies provide the most comprehensive Distributed Security Architecture available. SonicWALL, Inc. is headquartered in Sunnyvale, CA. SonicWALL trades on the NASDAQ exchange under the symbol SNWL. For more information, contact SonicWALL at 408-745-9600 or visit the company web site at http://www.sonicwall.com.

For Additional Information Contact: Kristin Fabos SonicWALL, Inc. +1.408.962.7108 kfabos@sonicwall.com Diane Ugolik SHIFT Communications +1.415.591.8403 dugolik@shiftcomm.com Safe Harbor Regarding Forward-Looking Statements Certain statements in this press release are "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. The forward-looking statements include but are not limited to statements regarding our ability to deliver new products at the best possible prices to our customers, the performance capabilities of our new products, our revitalization process, and development of our product and service offerings. These forward-looking statements are based on the opinions and estimates of management at the time the statements are made and are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements. These risks include but are not limited to: our reliance on sales to distributors and resellers; general risks associated with international sales; risks associated with the recent changes in our senior management; the risk that the development of our new products will be delayed or that our competitors will develop products similar to ours; and the risk that our recent restructurings will have an adverse effect on our business. In addition, please see the "Risk Factors" described in our Securities and Exchange Commission filings, including our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2002 and Form 10-Q for subsequent periods, for a more detailed description of the risks facing our business. All forward-looking statements included in this release are based upon information available to SonicWALL as of the date of the release, and we assume no obligation to update any such forward-looking statement.