IBM and Red Hat Offer Free Access to Vulnerability-Fixing Platform

IBM and Red Hat have announced a new program to provide their Lightwell platform at no charge to over 185 leading research universities and 100 major nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and think tanks in the United States. The initiative aims to strengthen the open source software supporting research, education, and mission-critical work by providing access to validated fixes for open source software vulnerabilities.

The program is a part of Lightwell's growing global network, which includes collaborations with leading financial institutions such as Bank of America, BNY, Citi, Goldman Sachs, JPMorganChase, Mastercard, Morgan Stanley, Royal Bank of Canada, State Street, Visa, and Wells Fargo. Red Hat's President and Chief Executive Officer, Matt Hicks, said that Lightwell combines automated remediation with deep open source engineering expertise and contributes fixes back upstream.

The participating institutions will receive access to Lightwell, including a growing library of remediated, digitally signed and validated open source dependencies, which can be integrated into existing software pipelines. This will help them address vulnerabilities without forcing disruptive upgrades or requiring access to their proprietary code, data, or research.