Intel Security outlines updated integrated solutions

Intel Security has outlined a new, unifying approach for the cybersecurity industry to eliminate fragmentation through updated integrated solutions, new cross-industry partnerships and product integrations within the Intel Security Innovation Alliance and Cyber Threat Alliance (CTA).

“Transforming isolated technologies into a cohesive security system is without a doubt the most daunting challenge facing practitioners today,” said Chris Young, senior vice president and general manager of Intel Security Group. “The battle against our adversaries cannot be fought alone; it will take people, products, organisations and industries working together to eliminate the fragmentation of security through automation, partnerships and unified architectures.”

The workforce shortage facing the cybersecurity industry makes it increasingly difficult to hire and retain employees. These scarce resources make it harder to maintain a coherent security architecture to prevent damage from and minimise the cost of emerging threats while embracing the potential of new open source, digital, cloud and security technologies.

“Our research and customer discussions have underscored the need for trusted partners that work cooperatively to reduce the burden of fragmented technologies and help organisations stay focused on securing their business assets and productivity,” Young added.

With this in mind, Intel Security is pleased to announce several new product integrations and updates, new industry partnerships and increased open source and standards-based collaboration that will strengthen the effectiveness of the cybersecurity infrastructure of enterprises.

At the heart of a unified strategy for cybersecurity, the company underlined, is the need for integrated solutions that tie into the enterprise’s framework to address top-of-mind challenges. Intel Security announces new and updated solutions that do exactly that: McAfee Enterprise Security Manager (ESM) 10 and McAfee Virtual Network Security Platform (vNSP).

Intel Security also highlighted that with the high cost of detecting and resolving cyber-attacks, the need for SIEM solutions that are intelligent and intuitive has never been greater. The newly released McAfee ESM 10 joins an expanded McAfee Foundstone security operations centre (SOC) services portfolio to help security analysts to be far more effective.

The need for advanced malware protection within the public cloud environment calls for integrated virtual solutions. McAfee vNSP now extends virtual network protection to Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud and OpenStack cloud deployments, with new simplified multi-cloud licensing, easily protecting virtual networks.

Transforming fragmentation requires the industry to work cooperatively to build meaningful integrations. Today, the Intel Security Innovation Alliance, the industry’s premier technology partnering programme, announces 16 new partnerships, bringing the total number of partners to more than 135 globally. Over the past year, 35 partners have integrated or planned integrations with the McAfee Data Exchange Layer (DXL), the industry-endorsed communication fabric, providing real-time interaction between applications.

Since announcing the OpenDXL initiative – an open industry standard for all developers to increase integration flexibility, simplicity and opportunity – Intel Security has expanded its commitment to open source and community adoption. Today, Intel Security is publishing more open source software on github.com/opendxl to further reduce high-integration complexity and cost, and replacing lengthy manual and repetitive processes for enterprises. Intel Security also announced that it is now sharing and consuming advanced threat intelligence through the Cyber Threat Alliance Platform (CTAP) and that it has a plan to further integrate CTAP with its products. CTAP is a platform that scores and shares threat intelligence among members of the Cyber Threat Alliance.

Shared CTAP Indicators of Compromise help Intel Security and other CTA members detect and better understand new, emerging attack campaigns. This allows CTA members to more quickly protect their customers’ systems.

As announced last week by the Cyber Threat Alliance, it is now formally incorporated as an independent, 501(c)(6) entity, with a president, board of directors and permanent standing committees. It is generously funded by the founding members – Intel Security, Fortinet, Palo Alto Networks, Symantec, Check Point and Cisco Systems. Each founding member has committed $1 million over the next two years to the success of the Cyber Threat Alliance.