PreEmptive Solutions' Dotfuscator Will ShipWith Microsoft Visual Studio 2005

REDMOND, Wash. and CLEVELAND, July 19 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT) and PreEmptive Solutions Inc., the leader in obfuscation, size reduction and optimization development tools, today announced the continued integration of the PreEmptive Dotfuscator Community Edition into Microsoft Visual Studio 2005. By providing obfuscation tools in the box, PreEmptive and Microsoft will provide developers writing code that will run on the Microsoft .NET Framework with an extra layer of protection against reverse-engineering, or decompilation. This integration enables organizations to make code-level security part of their overall software development life cycle. The Dotfuscator Community Edition will be distributed with the beta and commercial releases of Microsoft Visual Studio 2005, significantly widening its community of users. Dotfuscator is available both in the box with Visual Studio 2005 and from the MSDN Web site for download by MSDN subscribers. (Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20000822/MSFTLOGO )

Microsoft first included code security products from PreEmptive in Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003. Today, PreEmptive remains one of the few companies whose products will ship with Visual Studio 2005.

"We are excited to continue our relationship with PreEmptive Solutions and support Dotfuscator Community Edition in Visual Studio 2005," said Nick Abbott, group manager in the .NET Developer Product Management Group at Microsoft. "Our mutual customers will benefit from Dotfuscator's ability to help developers protect their code and build more secure .NET Framework-based applications."

The Dotfuscator Community Edition provides features such as PreEmptive's patented Overload-Induction renaming technology that makes it virtually impossible to reconstruct the source code from a compiled application because the original overloading relationships are destroyed.

"Protecting access to source code and creating compact and efficient applications are two of the most important issues in developing applications," said Gabriel Torok, president of PreEmptive Solutions. "Integrating our solution into Visual Studio 2005 provides the security developers and corporations demand."

"Before undertaking a migration to Microsoft .NET technologies, corporate enterprises must be sure their enterprise applications are inherently secure. PreEmptive's new Dotfuscator software -- which is integrated into Visual Studio 2005 -- addresses that concern," said Laura DiDio, application infrastructure and software platforms senior analyst with the Yankee Group in Boston. "Typically, the word 'obfuscation' means confusion, [and] carries a negative connotation. But just the opposite is true of the Dotfuscator package. The Dotfuscator software is a positive step on the road to secure application development: It's meant to confuse and confound would-be hackers, making it extremely difficult to tamper with the integrity of .NET Framework- based applications. Developing applications with Visual Studio 2005 just got safer with the integration of PreEmptive's Dotfuscator."

Developers can easily upgrade to Dotfuscator Professional Edition for an added level of protection and size reduction with advanced features such as Control Flow Obfuscation, Pruning, String Encryption, Enhanced Overload Induction, Incremental Obfuscation, Automated Stack Trace Translations, PDB Debugging Support, XML/HTML Report Files, Rich Visual Studio Integration and Integration with Build Scripts.

Customer Benefits: Several Fortune 500 corporations have integrated code security into their development process and currently rely on Dotfuscator technology in their operations. Ease of use and platform migration continue to be the driving factors for these companies when they are choosing a code security software solution, said Mats Hagberg, method area manager for .NET applications at Volvo Information Technology AB in the United States.

"We needed to protect our intellectual property and make sure no one has access to our code within these diagnostics," Hagberg said. "We chose PreEmptive Solutions for several reasons: the level of security PreEmptive Solutions provides, the low maintenance and the fact that we needed a solution that worked on multiple platforms."

Availability: Microsoft is now distributing PreEmptive's Dotfuscator Community Edition with the beta 1 version of Visual Studio 2005. Dotfuscator Community Edition will be included free and automatically installed as part of Microsoft Visual Studio 2005. Dotfuscator Professional Edition includes advanced features that provide strong code protection and make .NET Framework-based applications as small and efficient as they can be. Pricing begins at $1,495. More information can be found at http://www.preemptive.com/ .

About PreEmptive Solutions: Founded in 1995, PreEmptive Solutions is the leading provider of advanced Java and .NET obfuscation tools giving unprecedented protection, optimization and size reduction. PreEmptive's Dotfuscator and DashO Family of Products help secure and improve the efficiency of .NET and Java code. Further information can be found at http://www.preemptive.com/ or by calling 216-732-5895.

About Microsoft: Founded in 1975, Microsoft is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.