The CC provides a standardised way of expressing security requirements and defines the respective set of rigorous criteria by which the product will be evaluated. It is widely recognized among IT professionals, government agencies, and customers as a seal of approval for mission-critical software.

SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 8 on IBM eServer xSeries has earned an Evaluation Assurance Level 2+ certification, commonly referred to as EAL2+. IBM and SuSE also announced that the companies have filed for a higher level of security certification for SuSE Linux, the Controlled Access Protection Profile with EAL3+ across the IBM eServer product line, which is expected later this year.

In addition to the Common Criteria certification, SLES 8 on IBM eServer platforms is excpected to meet the Common Operating Environment (COE) standard later this year. This will lead to a product that simultaneously meets Common Criteria and COE requirements. This standard, unique to the US Department of Defense (DoD), addresses functionality and interoperability requirements for commercially acquired IT products. The COE specification is used to verify the look and feel and function of software products as they are joined with government customised code. The COE is broadly recognised as a standard computing environment across the U.S. Government command and control systems.

The evaluation was completed by atsec information security GmbH, one of the world's leading vendor-independent IT security consulting companies, accredited in Germany by the Federal Office for Information Security (BSI).

Under Common Criteria, products are evaluated against strict standards for various features, such as the development environment, security functionality, the handling of security vulnerabilities, security related documentation and product testing. In certifying SLES 8 on IBM xSeries, atsec information security GmbH evaluated how SuSE Linux develops, tests and maintains its products, as well as assessing the processes in place at the company for handling security issues in its software.

IBM and SuSE have committed to release key components of the Common Criteria evaluation to the CCeLinux Consortium and Linux development community, by the end of the month. In addition, IBM and SuSE will continue to work with the open source development community to actively enhance Linux security to make Linux even more secure than it is today.

In addition to IBM's ongoing commitment to accelerate the development and certification of Linux as a secure, industrial strength operating system, IBM intends to continue to invest in ongoing certifications for new and existing IBM products. IBM plans to seek Common Criteria certification for IBM's premier virtualisation technology, z/VM, in the upcoming year. z/VM helps enable mainframe customers to run tens to even hundreds of instances of the Linux operating system on a single IBM zSeries server.