INTELLIGENT BRANDS // Enterprise Security
Looking at 2016/2017, what does
Malwarebytes see as the main
demands of end-user enterprises
and government entities in the
region in terms of infrastructure
virtualisation services and the
security of same?
Wherever technical systems which
provide access to sensitive information
are held, either virtual or on-premise,
they are vulnerable to attack in some
form. Cyber criminals adapted their
methods to take into account the trend
towards virtual infrastructure some time
ago. Advanced malware treats virtual
infrastructure no differently, and your
security posture should be the same.
Protected is protected.
The Middle East is notorious
for a more reluctant adoption
of cloud/virtualised data
architecture than other more
developed markets. How is
Malwarebytes adequately
reassuring current and potential
clients that workloads migrating
off of dedicated servers and
visibility into critical data
can remain in the hands of
management?
There are two underlying threat vectors
that are vital to protecting data in the
cloud, people and technology. We
obviously help the technology be less
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vulnerable, stopping endpoints from
becoming exploited and malicious
software installed.
Unchecked, this malware can either sit
and monitor how people access their
data by stealing valuable cloud logins, or
moving sideways across networks until it
finds a ‘host’ which allows it access to the
target info. We stop advanced malware
being able to do this by denying it access
in the first place.
In comparison to more developed
markets, are enterprises in the
region adequately aware of and/
or preparing sufficiently for
more advanced data breaches,
especially in the age of private/
hybrid cloud adoption?
In today’s cyber security landscape,
geography is a decreasingly important
factor in data safety. Whether it is the
Middle East or North America, software
threats are a fact of daily life. Because
of this ominous situation, people are
either already aware and trying to
address this ever-changing problem, or
planning to do so.
Cloud adoption, virtualisation,
big data and mobility have
been big talking points for
2016. How is Malwarebytes
advising enterprises an/or
powered by
government entities to best
prioritise investments for 20162017 across these operations in
order to better reinforce data
architecture security?
We would rather split things down in
terms of what threats are prevalent, and
at the moment the biggest game in town
is ransomware. We are seeing a flood of
this because it is cheap to produce, and
easy to distribute in high volumes.
Not only this, but we have also seen
ransomware which is custom built to
target enterprises. This is the topic we
would like to make people most aware
of, as it is a nasty threat, one mistake and
crucial work data could be encrypted,
losing money and time. It is the
equivalent of a modern protection racket.
How has the BYOD phenomenon
affected how Malwarebytes
does business and how are
clients best protecting their
networks with BYOD becoming
increasingly dominant?
BYOD is a huge threat. People tend to
think of it only in terms of mobile phones
and tablets, but actually companies now
employ an army of consultants. Each
consultant typically comes with their own
laptop, all of which need connecting to
the network, creating an array of potential
risk points which need to be vetted.
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