There were several partner, funding and product announcements this week. Notable was Oasis Security raising $35 million in a Series A funding round led by Sequoia Capital. It will allow the company to hire more staff across the regions in which it operates.
Bugcrowd
Bugcrowd has launched the CrowdConnect Partner Program. It wants to help partners use crowdsourcing to help to defeat cyber attackers. Partners will be given support to recruit staff and develop their business.
Paul Ciesielski, Chief Revenue Officer of Bugcrowd, said, “Our guiding mission is to arm our growing partner network around the globe with a disruptive, innovative SaaS platform to proactively reduce the risk of being blindsided by today’s sophisticated threats.
“We’ve designed CrowdConnect to be valuable for our partners, allowing them to differentiate their products through access to our Bugcrowd Platform.”
According to Bugcrowd, the CrowdConnect Partner Program will deliver:
- Access to a highly differentiated platform that addresses multiple customer needs
- Results from Bugcrowd’s ongoing investment in the channel and reinvestment in partners
- Healthy margins and deal-registration protection
- Rewards and incentives for both volume and value partners
NOYB
NOYB has released the results of a survey among more than 1000 data protection professionals working in European companies. The survey was released on Data Protection Day and delivers some worrying findings. It found that:
- 70% of respondents say authorities need to issue clear decisions and enforce the GDPR to ensure compliance.
- 74% say that authorities would find ‘relevant violations’ if they would walk through the door of an average company.
- Authorities would need to fundamentally change their approach to enforcement to get businesses to comply.
The survey delivers other findings that are seriously concerning. They show that the role of the DPO is being compromised by business leaders. It states, “DPOs are under pressure to limit GDPR compliance in the interest of business: 46% of respondents said that sales and marketing were actively pressuring them to limit compliance, while 32% felt pressured by members of senior management.”
The biggest offenders are marketing departments. A shocking 56% of respondents said it was difficult to convince the marketing department to improve compliance. Just as concerning, 38.5% had problems with senior management.
OKTA
Okta announced the appointment of a new CRO and CMO. Jon Addison has been named Chief Revenue Officer (CRO), and Kerry Ok, Chief Marketing Officer (CMO). Addison has been interim CRO since February 2023, and this announcement confirms him in the post.
Addison said, “Our customers are looking to address the threat landscape by leveraging AI, building seamless customer experiences and implementing Zero Trust security. I’m honored to serve as Chief Revenue Officer and to help address this mission-critical need, backed by an industry-leading team skilled at driving innovation. It’s an incredibly exciting time to focus on AI and identity, and Okta is well-positioned to expand its leadership position.”
Ok, said, “There’s never been a more complex landscape for security professionals, IT admins, developers and marketers than today, and Okta is uniquely positioned at the center of each of these worlds. We have a huge opportunity to educate and engage our customers about the power of identity in this pivotal moment, and I’m thrilled with the opportunity to help lead our team.”
QUALYS
Two announcements from Qualys Inc. this week. The first is an announcement that it is expanding Qualys CyberSecurity Asset Management (CSAM). The product will now identify unmanaged and untrusted devices in real-time. It will use the Qualys Cloud Agent to continuously monitor the network. the company says it will “calculate the TruRisk of every asset and eliminate risk based on business impact.”
Qualys CyberSecurity Asset Management with passive sensing provides organizations with:
- Complete Internal Attack Surface Coverage.
- Lays the Foundation for Zero Trust Security Architecture.
- Turbocharges CMDB Accuracy and Coverage.
Sumedh Thakar, president and CEO of Qualys, said, “By adding passive discovery to Qualys’ more than 100 million deployed Cloud Agents, we are providing organizations with a unique expansion of attack surface coverage that requires no additional overhead, cost, or resources to maintain.
“Bringing significantly more visibility to unknown devices as part of their risk management programs, CISOs now have an ace-in-the-hole to defend against shadow IT; a huge step as organizations move toward a Zero Trust Security Architecture.”
The second announcement is an expansion of its partnership with Orange Cyberdefense. It will see the Qualys Vulnerability Management, Detection and Response (VMDR) products included in Orange Cyberdefense’s managed Vulnerability Intelligence Service.
Jenny Antonsson, Head of Global Vulnerability Operations Center at Orange Cyberdefense, said, “Expanding our partnership with Qualys felt natural. It is more important than ever for global organizations to effectively prioritize efforts in their fight against threats, which are increasing in complexity & volumes.
“Partnering with Qualys coupled with our proprietary vulnerability intelligence and expertise enables Orange Cyberdefense to achieve just that for our customers.”
