With acquisition of Global DataGuard, the managed service provider is offering new capabilities to predict and ward off advanced malware threats.

April 8, 2014

2 Min Read
Masergy Makes Serious Security Move

With its acquisition of Global DataGuard, Masergy Communications has significantly upgraded its security service capabilities, incorporating the ability to get out ahead of advanced persistent threats, according to its top executives. (See Masergy Acquires Global DataGuard.)

Masergy Communications Inc. was already delivering both cloud-based and perimeter firewall solutions but those were pretty much industry standard options, says John Dumbleton, SVP of business development. The Global DataGuard purchase gives Masergy-patented technology for network behavioral analysis that can overlay existing firewalls and intrusion detection/prevention systems. When combined with Global DataGuard's 24X7 human monitoring, the security service can identify and predict new attacks, even the kind that silently invade networks and stay there, quietly stealing data.

"Everyone now is aware of the kind of attack that hit Target," Dumbleton says. That malware gained access to the Target network via a vendor's use of an API to file an invoice and sat on the network, quietly collecting customer account information for months.

With the expanding access to the enterprise network that accompanies electronic connections and bring-your-own-device strategies, enterprises need to do more than protect against known problems -- those with identified signatures -- and react to others as they develop, he adds.

"The Global DataGuard technology is 100% passive and it overlays and unifies existing security, so if a company has firewalls or IDS, this will come in and overlay their solution, collect all the data from those devices and include that in broader analysis," Dumbleton says.

That analysis of network behavior doesn't rely on existing malware signatures but can identify "poly-morphic malware" -- the kind of threat that can change its appearance and signature -- and the periodic threats that may only attack on occasion but have serious impact.

Masergy has done pre-integration of the Global DataGuard capabilities and is already offering an advanced managed security service it calls Unified Enterprise Security, which integrates Global DataGuard's advanced threat management. In addition, Masergy now offers professional services to include risk and threat assessment, regulatory, and compliance assessments and more.

— Carol Wilson, Editor-at-Large, Light Reading

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