[ILUG] FortiOS & Linux

[Paul Reilly]

Has anyone been following the gpl-violations.org  case
against Fortinet? Do the fortinet firewalls run Linux?

http://gpl-violations.org/news/20050414-fortinet-injunction.html

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1786088,00.asp

---> from GPL-Violations.org --->
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fortinet offers a variety of Firewall and Antivirus Products (the
FortiGate and FortiWiFi product series), on which Fortinet claims to run
the "FortiOS" operating system. However, as the gpl-violations.org project
uncovered, "FortiOS" is using the Linux operating system kernel and
numerous other free software products that are licensed exclusively under
the GNU GPL.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

But then today, Fortinet put out the following statement, which seems to
downplay the whole situation, and states that only a "very small piece of
FortiOS firmware contains GPL software".

So I wonder which is true?
Does Fortinet run Linux?

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Fortinet Response to alleged misuse of code released under the General
Public License

April 15th 2005

Further to the recent media notification by Harald Welte, a Linux kernel
developer who runs gpl-violations.org, Fortinet were notified of Mr.
Welte's allegations of administrative non compliance and have, in good
faith, diligently worked with him to resolve this matter outside of the
German court system.

Fortinet constantly works to ensure that its products are fully compliant
with General Public License requirements and we were therefore surprised
that Mr. Welte pursued a preliminary injunction against Fortinet in
Germany, believing this to be a totally unnecessary action.

The action was taken because Fortinet^s End User License Agreement (EULA),
that ships with every FortiGate and other hardware system, did not
explicitly state that a very small piece of FortiOS firmware contains GPL
software. This has now been addressed and all new products will be shipped
with a revised EULA that does clarify the use of this software, as well as
a GPL Licensing Agreement, and therefore all Fortinet products are in
total GPL compliance.

Mr Welte has publicly acknowledged in print today that this filing does
not Mr Welte has publicly acknowledged in print today that this filing
does not prohibit Fortinet from distributing product anywhere throughout
the World, including Germany.

It is unfortunate that the GPL team has a record of repeatedly filing
lawsuits against growing technology companies such as Fortinet to
seemingly serve their own commercial interests rather than those of the
overall industry. GPL recently highlighted their lawsuits to the Media
recently at CeBit, publicly noting their distribution of 13 new letters to
vendors at the event:

http://gpl-violations.org/news/20050314-cebit-letter-action.html

The Fortinet code in question is the same code that was used to gain our
EAL4+ and NSS certification and Fortinet US confirms that all outstanding
issues have been resolved.

If you have any further questions, please contact:

Jonathan Mepsted
Regional Director
Fortinet (UK) Ltd

E-Mail: jmepsted at fortinet.com

Web:     http://www.fortinet.com