Enterprise security vendor McAfee has announced an extension to its general purpose VirusScan Enterprise range, aimed at protecting specific mission-critical applications.

The first three new products supported will be, VirusScan Enterprise for Offline Virtual Images, VirusScan Enterprise for SAP NetWeaver, and VirusScan Enterprise for Storage.

The move was prompted by the way threats had evolved from "mass mailing viruses to more targeted attacks and threats targeting OS vulnerabilities, to attacks against applications," said McAfee's product management vice president, Rees Johnson.

VirusScan Enterprise for Offline Virtual Images will secure offline virtual operating system images, which could become reliant on out-dated patches during periods of inactivity. "Imagine somebody going on maternity leave, then coming back and firing up an unpatched virtual desktop. This software automatically patches offline virtual images periodically, so they won't compromise security when they are booted up," said Sal Viveros, a security expert at McAfee.

Viveros added that Citrix, Microsoft and VMware systems will be supported.

For the storage market, McAfee's new product VirusScan Enterprise for Storage, will scan and disinfect files before they are written to the storage. "It'll reside in front of the storage controller," said Viveros.

The system will also use real-time malware scanning hoping to avoid propagating malware to other parts of enterprise's IT infrastructure. Viveros said that support at this time would be for EMC, NetApp, and Sun storage systems.

The final system is aimed at protecting SAP's NetWeaver platform, McAfee citing as an example VirusScan Enterprise for use with SAP NetWeaver, being able to prevent uploads into the system, like infected CVs, from compromising SAP's system.

Beta versions of the software will be available in July, with full versions pencilled to ship by the year's end.