cyber trends he need for organisations

Security teams had to deal with overloaded VPNs , insecure home networks and personal devices , as well as the challenges around continued patching . And , as security teams continue in their attempts to navigate this ‘ curveball ’ they ’ ve been thrown , the complex technology estate they have in place – comprising multiple point solutions and multiple agents , multiple consoles and a slow manual response – is at the core of their dilemma .

Next-generation security architecture , he said , needed to offer a consolidated approach to minimise the number of agents and sensors , and collect data in real time . Overcoming this challenge , he said , was key to the premise of the Qualys Cloud Platform , which can collect relevant data , correlate it and manage prioritisation and prevention .

The Qualys Cloud Platform aims to address this with its three core pillars .

Qualys Interim CEO and Chief Product Officer , Sumedh Thakar

1 . Asset inventory . Complete visibility into an organisation ’ s global asset inventory – knowing every asset , whether managed or unmanaged , hardware or software , and being able to organise , automatically , what device belongs to which business unit , which application , which data centre , that global asset inventory , no matter what infrastructure it is , is the same .

2 . Prevention and remediation . Being able to detect vulnerabilities , ensuring configurations are correct and being able to take remedial action to minimise the opportunities for attackers to compromise devices .

3 . Detection and response . The ability to respond to zero-day threats , protection against malware and ultimately reducing the time to remediate .

In addition , he said , compliance reporting could be considered the fourth pillar , adding that if security measures were implemented correctly , the compliance part would take care of itself and reporting would be very straightforward .

“ And the big fundamental shift that happened in 2020 is that we went from being able to use several of these sensors , collecting the data , bringing them into a single platform and showing the correlated visibility , and moving from just visibility into being able to take responsive action ,” he said .

Thakar highlighted Qualys ’ own Digital Transformation , which has enabled the company to expand the scope of its security offering , making it accessible in one centralised platform . He highlighted the ongoing enhancement to the platform – not just ‘ little features ’ – including comprehensive visibility and comprehensive response actions , as well as continued improvements to the user experience .

A customer ’ s perspective

The adoption of public cloud – and the benefits of it – were also highlighted by C-level end-users in a customer roundtable at the QSC EMEA ’ 21 Virtual Event .

The panel was asked to discuss their strategic positioning towards the public cloud , with participants highlighting the opportunities this will provide , as well as security considerations arising .

Bruno Laurent , Cyber Defense Head , AXA , said using SaaS and PaaS solutions has enabled capacity for the business to digitally accelerate . The benefits that can be unlocked when solution providers deliver innovation is also ‘ instantaneous ’.

Cloud , ‘ done right ’ was also highlighted as a business growth-enabler by Jared Carstensen , CISO , CRH . He said : “ I think for me , personally , cloud done right takes you to the next level in terms of where you can go as a business . I think it can remove so many barriers and act as so many levers that you can start to pull , such as speed , efficiency , metrics , management and oversight .”

Thakar told panellists that cloud is ‘ more about the architecture ’. He reiterated that Qualys itself had been able to significantly expand from having a single solution , to having multiple different capabilities on the single platform in the last couple of years . This is an area which is also benefitting security .

“ And that ’ s the same when we ’ re looking at security . Cloud does offer an opportunity where you can go to one platform and be able to leverage all of the things that you need for your security and not have to buy 50 different solutions and vendors and put them together ,” he added . u

You can access on-demand content from QCS EMEA ’ 21 or try a free trial at qualys . com www . intelligentciso . com

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