Intelligent CIO APAC Issue 03 | Page 76

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IT CAN NO LONGER RELY ON A USER TO BE ON NETWORK OR TO BE CONNECTED TO A VPN TO RECEIVE SUPPORT .

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simultaneously ransoming organizations ’ critical infrastructure . In 2019 there was a drastic increase in average ransoms due to another tactical change : ransomware was now paired with data exfiltration .
Sodinokibi and Ryuk , who have perfected this combination attack , quickly rose through the ranks of ransomware families . As a result , the average ransom paid had gone from US $ 9,000 to US $ 111,605 by the end of Q1 2020 .
Beneath these attacks , the same security controls are being exploited . A user is phished , a vulnerability is exploited , or a credential is stolen to gain access . Once in , the threat actors use automated and manual means to move about the environment , find and exfiltrate sensitive data , and execute the ransomware attack .
Chris Goettl , Senior Director , Product Management for Security , Ivanti
What key challenges are CISOs currently facing ?
CISOs are faced with significant challenges . Pre-COVID-19 challenges are now compounded by the pandemic . Depending on your industry , you are either worried about remote workers and how to balance security initiatives with Business Continuity or you are deep into physical security and safety concerns if remote work is not an option .
Most organizations ’ remote workers prior to the pandemic were managed acceptably

IT CAN NO LONGER RELY ON A USER TO BE ON NETWORK OR TO BE CONNECTED TO A VPN TO RECEIVE SUPPORT .

through a VPN and other tools . With most users now working remotely , tools may be stretched to meet demands and security requirements . Many CISOs have had to make hard decisions around prioritizing Business Continuity over security in the short term .
How have your customer requirements changed and how have you adapted ?
Customer requirements have definitely changed due to COVID-19 . Prior to the pandemic , only a small number of remote workers needed support . A good example of this is Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager ( SCCM ) customers and the push to InTune .
Ivanti has a third-party updates plugin for SCCM that allows a company to easily publish hundreds of non-Microsoft application titles into SCCM quickly and easily . This saves companies an average of two to four hours of effort to package and test third party updates as they release .
Prior to COVID-19 , companies asked if there were plans to support Microsoft InTune with our third-party updates solution , but it was not yet a requirement . Most were either evaluating or in early planning phases and had not yet rolled out . Since COVID-19 this has become a common question and requirement , so it was fortuitous we already had a release planned for November 2020 to deliver InTune support .
This same pattern plays out across many IT solutions . Ivanti ’ s proprietary patch solutions already had the ability to support
remote users so what was previously ‘ niceto-have ’ became ‘ essential ’.
Other capabilities like Remote Control , Discovery and many other IT tools used daily suddenly needed to shift off premise in their coverage . The Ivanti Neurons launch delivers on many of these needs . IT can no longer rely on a user to be on network or to be connected to a VPN to receive support . They need solutions that transcend the network and VPN providing seamless support for their customers .
Tell us about Ivanti Neurons – how is the technology helping security teams ?
Ivanti Neurons provides IT organizations with the capabilities they need to evolve . Many of the challenges we face today arguably have been solved in some way . What IT organizations need now is a means to solve problems at scale , while transcending the traditional network boundaries and with the ability to shift left .
Ivanti Neurons for Discovery : Know what ’ s on your network , make sense of your asset data and expand visibility . Ensuring there are no gaps or unmanaged devices is critical to securing your environment ’ s
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