EMA Blog: Business Intelligence and IT Management

This week, Las Vegas hosted some 3500 people at the MGM Grand to mark Splunk .conf14, the annual user gathering for Splunk customers, referred to as “Splunkers”. For those of you not in the tech industry, spelunking, or the act of exploring caves, may come to mind. The theme of the conference was not cave exploration, but data exploration; however, the analogy of cave exploration actually aligns very well. “Splunkers” are diving into their data, delving deep into places that many have never explored before. Each of them finding new and cool ways to use the data that they have been collecting for years, just-in-case they ever needed it.

On April 23^rd, 2014 Dell announced its new Vulnerability Threat Monitoring and Prioritization service delivered through the SecureWorks Counter Threat Platform.  This managed service was created to expand the current Vulnerability Management offerings and increase customer value by creating the ability for customers to integrate their own vulnerability management systems.  With the additional context provided through Risk I/O, remediation and mitigation prioritization are done less in a bubble of the operational environment and more in context with the Internet threat universe.

What’s the issue with BYOD? Data Control… What’s the issue with Data Sharing? Data Control!

The emotions oscillate between high frustration and high jubilation as I observe cyber-attack teams’ hacking activities against an unnamed financial institution…

I see a significant gap in not only how the need for Security Awareness training is perceived as needed but also in the general quality of the programs and training delivered vs other types of training.  In many cases small companies avoid security awareness training due to ignorance, cost fears, or fears it will stifle their culture of creativity.  This research project is structured to give CIO’s, CISO’s, and other security and IT managers the data to motivate them to provide in security awareness training programs thereby bringing about change in their organizations.

With all of the negative attention that the NSA – RSA relationship (or deal) has been getting, many are fired up.  If the deal went down anything like it has been reported by Reuters, then rightfully so.  However, the last minute boycotts of the RSA event to show disapproval are a bit much.

Recently I briefed with ForeScout Technologies, a Network Admission/Access Control (NAC) vendor, to get an update on the CounterACT platform it has been delivering and developing for a few years and to see its recently announced ControlFabric technology.  I thought it wise to take another look at NAC vendors and how they address BYOD, rogue, or non-compliant devices that can be the source of many compliance and security headaches including advanced/targeted threats.