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October 2022

Ashley Leonard

The Convergence of Endpoint Management & Endpoint Security: A Q&A with Ashley Leonard, CEO

By Blog

The Convergence of Endpoint Management & Endpoint Security

A Q&A with Ashley Leonard CEO, Syxsense Inc.

Leonard discussed unified endpoint management (UEM), key trends, and how Syxsense is bringing together the fields of UEM and unified endpoint security (UES) with its Syxsense Enterprise product.

What are the biggest trends in UEM?

The biggest trend in UEM currently is the addition of security tools to the traditional UEM toolset. Gartner is now calling out security functionality as a key product ingredient in its latest UEM Magic Quadrant. In an effort to narrow down the attack surface that comes from multiple agents and multiple consoles, customers are searching for solutions that provide both functions.

Another hot trend in UEM is the fact that more intelligence is filtering through the haystack of incoming security telemetry into a meaningful subset of what is critical in user environments. This includes key features such as better management of supersedence (i.e., new patches being issued that combine and replace multiple older patches from the same vendor), as well as better insight into the kind of threats that are triggered based on presence or lack of presence of vulnerable software in the environment.

We are also seeing solutions hitting the market that combine the necessary functionality to remediate threats that are blended: threats that require the application of a patch as well as configuration changes. This ties with threat prioritization whereby both patch and security threats are given different levels of risk based on the specifics of their environments. And finally, we are seeing software designed to bring about intelligent endpoints that can automatically maintain an endpoint in a desired state.

What are the key features of Syxsense Enterprise?

Our solution provides three critical functions.

  1. Scanning, detection, prioritization, and application of missing patches.
  2. Scanning, detection, prioritization, and remediation of security vulnerabilities most often caused by misconfigurations such as open ports, firewall settings, device sharing, etc.
  3. Remediation of all these threats using a SOAR-like product called Syxsense Cortex that allows for drag-and-drop remediation workflows with no coding or scripting required. And while the Cortex product is drop dead simple to use, most customers will never need to use it, as our security research team continually monitors the threat landscape for emerging threats and pre-build Cortex workflows and playbooks that provide quick-turn remediation.

 Some competitors partner with 3rd party companies to provide similar functionality. However, their tools operate in silos without the benefit of a coherent workflow tool that provide seamless integration. Syxsense Enterprise offers a single agent that not only automates the management of endpoints but secures reduces the attack surface and simplifies management.

Is there a coming together of UEM and UES?

Definitely. We see customers continuing to move toward combined solutions. We also see it in the analyst community as reputable analysts such as Forrester and Gartner begin requiring endpoint tools to have both security and IT management functions. In addition to its patch management and mobile device management (MDM) features, Syxsense Enterprise does deep scanning for known security flaws and provides a list of misconfigurations that require remediation. It provides Syxscore, a scoring methodology that reports on discovered threats and how prevalent they are in customers’ environments. High priority threats can be remediated immediately, allowing security teams to allocate their time and resources to remediating the most critical flows first, and then moving to lower tiers of threat as time allows.

In addition, our security research team provides pre-built workflows and playbooks that accomplish key IT management functions. This encompasses tasks such as setting up new laptops and rolling out new software as well remediating security flaws using Syxsense Cortex. The simple drag-and-drop interface enables customers to build their own workflows with little expertise and no coding. Once an environment is clean, our tool provides “proof of compliance” against industry standards (HIPAA, PCI, etc.) that is often required for security insurance or reporting.

In summary, our intelligent, zero-trust approach combines the user (location/time etc.) plus the state of the endpoint (patch, AV, security status) to control real-time access to corporate assets.

Syxsense demo

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Syxsense combines IT management, patch management, and security vulnerability scanning in one powerful solution. Get started today.

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Overcoming Your Endpoint Security Limitations with a Skeleton Crew

By Endpoint Security

Overcoming Your Endpoint Security Limitations with a Skeleton Crew

Five ways to bolster your endpoint security defenses quickly

For years overstretched and under-resourced organizations have contended with a lack of robust cybersecurity expertise to defend their networks and data, leaving them ripe for attack or internal mutiny. As far back as 2016, 46% of businesses reported a “problematic shortage” of their current cybersecurity talent, which ballooned to more than 2.72 million in 2021. Not only is hiring a nightmare but getting talent proficient in cybersecurity is more challenging than ever.

When it comes to ensuring your endpoints and networks are secure, you can’t spend long cycles onboarding and training new talent. Threats don’t wait. You don’t have years! You need solutions that are simple to deploy, manage, and maintain. Threat actor tactics evolve quickly. Your endpoint defense must as well. This ebook will dive into the scary realities of overstretched and under-resourced teams, provide some tips on how you can improve endpoint security with limited staff, and offer a glimpse into how Syxsense helps automate your entire endpoint defense.

Download the eBook

app jungle

Welcome to the App Jungle

By Blog

Welcome to the App Jungle

The jungle is a hostile environment. Predators lurk at every turn. Most of the predators, in turn, are prey for those higher up the food chain. The chances of offspring reaching maturity are small. No wonder the corporate world has been likened to a jungle at times.

The same analogy can now be used in the wild world of applications. There are now apps for everything. The phone company, the fast food joint, the condo association – they all want you to download and use their apps. Anytime you go to a trade show, there is a trade show app to download. When you do business with a new client, there are typically several apps needed to take care of billing, project management, and collaboration. A tropical rain forest of apps of Amazonian proportions has emerged.

Apps Let the Bad Guys In

Data removal company Incogni analyzed 1,000 of the top apps in the Google Play Store. It included both paid and unpaid apps. The results were surprising.

  • 55 shared data with third parties.
  • The free apps were especially bad, sharing seven times more data points than paid apps.
  • Shopping apps came out badly, sharing an average of 5.72 data points.
  • Social media apps, too, were problematic. They collect 19.18 data points; they say they share only 3 of them, but it is likely to be more.

It gets worse from the standpoint of security:

  • Less than 50% state that their data is encrypted in transit. However, the number is probably more – only 5% of apps admit openly that they don’t encrypt data in transit. Expect that to be the case among far more of them.
  • Less than 1% go through an independent security review, meaning that 99% have no external check point to catch weak security or privacy practices.
  • Shockingly, 6 out of ten apps don’t provide any way for a user to request data removal, and 10% make it clear that any personal data collected cannot be deleted.

In other words, welcome to the jungle!

Dealing with the App Jungle

The state of the current app jungle should be a cause for deep concern among IT and security professionals. Think about the number of devices that each user has – PCs, desktops, tablets, and smartphones. On many of these, the user can download whatever they please. Even if corporate laptops are locked down via administrative privileges that prevent unsanctioned downloads, it is almost impossible to completely block the presence of the app jungle.

Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) practices are commonplace that allow employees to work from home. The device owners have the right to pick and choose the apps they wish. If the laptops are owned by the corporation, smartphones are overwhelmingly the personal devices of employees. Any attempt to enforce corporate policy on these is doomed to failure.

Some businesses send employees smartphones for business use. That doesn’t solve the problem. Few employees will put up with complete control of their phone by corporate IT. They will either find a workaround, convince someone to give them admin rights to that phone, or will have another for personal use. All it takes is that personal smart phone to get infected and the disease can spread from personal phone to corporate smartphone to laptop and hop into the corporate network. Data, after all, will be swapped from one device to another. There is no avoiding this. The jungle is never going to be far away no matter what policies and safeguards are in place.

That’s why enterprises need a way to plug and holes due to vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, and unpatched systems. They need a way to manage mobile devices as well as all endpoints across the enterprise wherever they may be. Syxsense gives organizations comprehensive security coverage across all devices. It discovers any devices operating on the network. It picks up any new devices as they are added and automatically applies the appropriate policies. This enables cradle-to grave-lifecycle management, eliminating the need to manually apply tasks to new devices. Coupled with the proven patch management, vulnerability, and IT management features, Syxsense brings together the best defense against the predatory lurking in application jungle.

Syxsense demo

Schedule Your Syxsense Demo

Syxsense combines IT management, patch management, and security vulnerability scanning in one powerful solution. Get started today.

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Embracing the Zero Trust Mindset for Endpoints

By Zero Trust

Embracing the Zero Trust Mindset for Endpoints

What is the Zero Trust mindset, and what are the basics of implementing a Zero Trust framework for IT security?

Zero Trust is a strategic security mindset that combines multiple security disciplines into a comprehensive solution. This white paper was written for Syxsense by Charles Kolodgy of Security Mindsets LLC. In the report, he explains the Zero Trust mindset, documents how it has evolved from concept to implementation, and walks through some basics around implementing a Zero Trust framework that you can utilize in your organization.

Embracing the Zero Trust Mindset for Endpoints

Download the White Paper

Syxsense demo

Schedule Your Syxsense Demo

Syxsense combines IT management, patch management, and security vulnerability scanning in one powerful solution. Get started today.

Schedule My Demo