Blue Coat Systems has expanded its WebPulse offering with a fifth data center in Australia, which will provide a better response against security threats, the firm’s ANZ Country Manager told IT Brief.

According to the company its new WebPulse service enhances the speed of dynamic ratings for regional customers while increasing web awareness and protection against web-based threats.

Wayne Neich, Country Manager, Australia and New Zealand for Blue Coat Systems, told IT Brief that as part of the firm’s cloud based approach to web security, data centers have been set up in strategic locations around the world to provide a comprehensive response to new and emerging threats on a region by region basis. The establishment of the new data center in Sydney is the firm’s fifth.

“It operates exactly as our other centers and they are all interconnected,” said Neich. “Having a WebPulse data center located in Australia makes provides even faster access time to customers in the geographical area. The regionally based data center will provide local users with an even faster response for web content classification and protection from the latest security threats.”

Neich explained that while there are no plans for a New Zealand data center, the WebPulse service for customers in New Zealand will be fulfilled from the new Australian center, rather than a centre based in Europe, Asia or the USA. He said this would provide a faster response for New Zealand users against phising scams, spyware and trojans.

“We continue to expand our WebPulse centers, but at this stage, there are no plans to set up a similar data center in New Zealand. The data centers are generally established on a regional basis, thus the Australian data center will serve to support the ANZ region,” Neich confirmed.