Transmit Security raises $543 million in a Series A round. Cerberus Sentinel acquires Ground Control IT.

By the CyberWire staff

At a glance.

Transmit Security raises $543 million in a Series A round.
Cerberus Sentinel acquires Ground Control IT.

Mergers and acquisitions.

Scottsdale, Arizona-based Cerberus Sentinel has acquired managed security services provider Ground Control IT (also based in Arizona). Cerberus stated, "Under the terms of the agreement, Ground Control will become part of Cerberus Sentinel and will continue to focus on providing integrated risk managed services to a diverse set of customers. With the new organizational structure, Ground Control President Ryan Greyslak will take on the role of vice president, managed services, for Cerberus Sentinel."

Denver, Colorado-headquartered identity security company Ping Identity has acquired SecuredTouch, a fraud detection and prevention firm based in Palo Alto, California. Ping Identity stated, "As SecuredTouch is integrated with the broader PingOne Cloud Platform, enterprise customers will have access to advanced signals, data, and intelligence to gain a greater understanding of fraudster behavior, and step up authentication when needed to stop malicious activity and reduce fraud loss. Customers will be able to deploy SecuredTouch as a stand alone solution or as part of the broader Ping One Cloud Platform."

SafeToNet, a London-headquartered company that seeks to protect children online, has acquired Citadel Filters, a Canadian company that uses machine learning to filter images, videos, and text, Threat.Technology reports. SafeToNet's executive chairman Richard Pursey stated, "By joining forces with Citadel Filters we have further strengthened our technology and especially on a Windows platform where Citadel is particularly strong. Their ability to block inadvertent or deliberate access to the dark web allows us to minimise the risk of children straying into areas online that can cause them irreparable harm. Their chat filters work in 44 languages allowing SafeToNet to further extend its growth into new international territories and therefore safeguard more children."

Reston, Virginia-based threat intelligence firm LookingGlass Cyber has acquired attack surface management AlphaWave (of Austin, Texas). The company stated, "The transaction complements LookingGlass's existing cyber risk and attack surface management capabilities (scoutPRIME®), in use across U.S. federal and state government since 2009, by enabling deeper attack surface visibility into cloud and container environments. The deal will also enable AlphaWave customers to access LookingGlass's deep and broad threat intelligence capabilities and repositories, adding strategic value for customers as they face increasing cyber threats and attacks."

Irish cybersecurity firm Integrity360 has been acquired by UK-based private equity firm August Equity, CRN reports.

New York-based threat monitoring and identity access management company FYEO has emerged from stealth with the acquisition of London-based threat intelligence company Intelliagg.

Investments and exits.

Reuters reports that Mountain View, California-based endpoint security firm SentinelOne is shooting for a valuation of more than $7 billion in its IPO.

Boston-headquartered biometric authentication company Transmit Security has secured $543 million in a Series A round led by Insight Partners and General Atlantic, with participation from Cyberstarts, Geodesic, SYN Ventures, Vintage, and Artisanal Ventures. Transmit Security says it's valued at $2.2 billion. The company says it "will use the funding to increase the company's reach and expand its primary business functions, investing in key global areas in order to grow the organization, ultimately enabling the company to accelerate its mission to help the world go passwordless." TechCrunch notes that the investment is "said to be the largest Series A investment in cybersecurity history and one of the highest valuations for a bootstrapped company."

New York-based industrial cybersecurity company Claroty has raised $140 million in a Series D round led by Bessemer Venture Partners and 40 North. The company says the "new funding will be used to accelerate the company’s expansion into new verticals and regions, as well as to further enhance its best-in-class product portfolio."

Paoli, Pennsylvania-headquartered privacy-focused search engine DuckDuckGo announced that it's raised more than $100 million in an investment round led by OMERS Ventures, Thrive, GP Bullhound, Impact America Fund, Brian Acton, Tim Berners-Lee, Freada Kapor Klein, Mitch Kapor, and others. The company says the investment created "an early liquidity moment for employees and early investors while strengthening our financial position."

Palo Alto, California-based cloud data security company Anjuna has raised $30 million in a Series B round led by Insight Partners. The company says the investment "enables Anjuna to bring its Anjuna Confidential Cloud Software Platform to market, and allows the company to continually evolve its technology and security innovations in the enterprise confidential computing market."

Tel Aviv-based cloud security platform provider Lightspin has raised $16 million in a Series A round led by Dell Technologies Capital, with "significant participation" from existing investor Ibex Investors. The company says the investment "will fuel cross-function innovation and growth as the company plans to triple the current number of employees, while maintaining its commitment to gender balance across all departments. New hiring will be divided between Israel and the US."

The Firmament Group has invested an undisclosed amount in Baltimore, Maryland-based cybersecurity company CyberPoint International. CyberPoint's CEO Karl Gumtow said, "Firmament's financial backing will catalyze the remarkable progress the team has already made developing next generation cybersecurity software products for our customers, while continuing to provide vital cybersecurity services to the federal agencies most responsible for the defense of our country."

Executive moves.

Mimecast has hired David Raissipour as Chief Technology & Product Officer. Raissipour previously served as Senior Vice President, Sophos Cloud Platform Group & Sophos Messaging Security Group at Sophos.

Foresite has appointed Mark Behan as Senior Vice President of Operations.

Iron Bow Technologies has hired Elliott Williams as Vice President of Strategic Alliances.

Ivanti has appointed Daniel Spicer as Vice President of Security.

SailPoint has added Sudhakar Ramakrishna to its board of directors. Ramakrishna currently serves as President and CEO of SolarWinds.

Platform9 has appointed Diane Bryant to its board of directors. Bryant has previously served as COO of Google Cloud and Group President of Intel’s Data Center Group.

Netskope has added Kimberly Alexy to its board of directors. Alexy currently serves on the boards of Alteryx, FireEye, Five9, and Western Digital.

Nisos has named Paul Kurtz to its board of directors. Kurtz currently serves as Chief Cybersecurity Advisor for the Public Sector at Splunk.

SentinelOne has added former CISA director Christopher Krebs to its advisory board.

Virsec has appointed Marnie Wilking as an advisor and board participant. Wilking currently serves as Global Head of Security and Technology Risk Management at Wayfair.

The importance of picking the right customers.

SecurityWeek reports that French authorities have indicted four former and current executives of Nexa Technology, an intercept company formerly known as Amesys, on charges of complicity with torture carried out by Egypt and the Libyan regime of the late Muammar Gadaffi. The problem lies principally in the selection of customer: when dealing with a sufficiently odious regime, companies expose themselves to legal and moral risk. Drawing the line isn't easy, to be sure, but that line certainly lies somewhere well this side of Muammar Gadaffi.

Marketplace

Companies Struggle to Keep Their Tech Workers From Logging Off (WSJ) Many information-technology workers in the U.S. are on the hunt for new jobs, seeking a wider array of remote work options, better chances for promotions and bigger paychecks, as Covid-19 restrictions ease and the economy rebounds.

U.S. Dept of Defense awards Verizon $495M contract to manage research network (Verizon) Verizon awarded Department of Defense contract to provide next generation network services in support of critical research initiatives like autonomous defense

Accenture Federal Services Wins $112 Million Task Order to Protect Federal Agencies from Cyber Breaches (BusinessWire) Accenture Federal Services won a $112 million task order to protect federal agencies from cyber breaches.

Palantir Stock Wins FAA Contract To Oversee Boeing 737 MAX Fleet's Return (Investor's Business Daily) Palantir announced a contract with the FAA to provide data analytics tools. But the announcement didn't give a lift to Palantir stock.

Plurilock Security (PLCKF) Wins $210,000 Purchase Order with California State Taxation Agency (InvestorsObserver) Plurilock Security (PLCKF) Wins $210,000 Purchase Order with California State Taxation Agency

Systemic cyberattacks trigger response from insurers (Insurance Business Magazine) Underwriters prepare for more events like SolarWinds and the Microsoft zero-day attacks

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Navy picks 10 computer companies to provide cyber security software development and hardware engineering (Military & Aerospace Electronics) Companies to provide cyber security, software development and training, hardware engineering, network engineering and information assurance.

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Vade Announces Unified Threat Detection and Incident Response for MSPs Amid Corporate Rebrand (Vade Secure) New integrated feature of Vade for M365 streamlines managed security for MSPs at no additional cost.

On a growth tear, DuckDuckGo reveals it picked up $100M in secondary investment last year (TechCrunch) Privacy tech continues cooking on gas. To wit: Non-tracking search engine DuckDuckGo has just revealed that it beefed up its balance sheet at the back end of last year with $100 million+ in “mainly secondary investment” — from a mix of existing and new investors. Its blog post nam…

Industrial Security Firm Claroty Raises $140M Round, Last Before IPO (CRN) Rockwell Automation, Siemens, Schneider, and LG are some of the strategic investors in Claroty.

Cerberus Sentinel announces acquisition of Ground Control IT (GlobeNewswire) U.S. cybersecurity services firm expands service offerings

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Products, Services, and Solutions

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Quarkslab Announces the Certification of Its Product Quarks AppShield (BusinessWire) Quarkslab is the first company worldwide to have certified its white-box cryptography solution under this highly demanding evaluation process.

WD-40 Eases Network Friction with Slick SD-WAN Overhaul (BusinessWire) WD-40 Enables Network Migration with Aryaka Managed Networking and Security.

DH2i Launches DxEnterprise (DxE) Smart Availability Software for Containers (DH2i) We are excited to announce the release of DxEnterprise (DxE) for AGs in Containers alongside our new DH2i Store and Developer Edition Program.

Shared Assessments Launches Third Party Risk Fundamentals Training (BusinessWire) Shared Assessments Launches Third Party Risk Fundamentals Training; Gives Entry-Level Professionals the Core Concepts/ Practices for Proficiency

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Telos Corporation Authorized as CMMC-AB Registered Provider Organization™ (RPO) (Telos Corporation) Ashburn, Va. – June 22, 2021 – Telos® Corporation (NASDAQ: TLS), a leading provider of cyber, cloud and enterprise security solutions for the world’s most security-conscious organizations, today announced that it has been approved as a Registered Provider Organization (RPO) by the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification Accreditation Body (CMMC-AB). As a CMMC-AB RPO, Telos offers... Read more

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Nuspire Expands Global Capabilities with an International Security Operations Center (SOC) (Nuspire) Nuspire adds first international security operations center (SOC) with both SOC/NOC capabilities

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Deep Instinct launches world’s highest value £2m warranty against ransomware in the UK (Business Leader) Deep Instinct, a deep learning-based cybersecurity form for predicting and preventing cyberattacks, is today announcing the world’s first combined ransomware and low false-positive warranty.

MS-ISAC expands member services to include Deloitte’s cyber portal (GCN) State and local governments that are members of the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center (MS-ISAC) now have free access to Deloitte’s secure online threat-intelligence platform.

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Behind the scenes of Verizon’s new SASE solution (CRN Australia) With APAC product and solutions director Helen Wong.

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MSAB launches new rapid triage extraction solution for immediate actionable intel in the field (GlobeNewswire) MSAB announces the launch of Raven, an innovative solution for immediate digital evidence acquisition and analysis at scene level via smartphone app.

ID.me’s Identity Gateway Achieves FedRAMP Moderate Authorization (ID.me) Identity verification platform used by VA, SSA and others, meets rigorous security requirements mandated for U.S. federal agencies

Cowbell Cyber Extends Partner Program to Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs) (Cowbell Cyber) A first-of-its-kind program closes gap between cyber insurance and MSSP services.

Avanan Launches Global Channel Partner Program to Extend Cloud Email and Collaboration Security Worldwide (Avanan) Avanan Launches its Global Channel Partner Program to Extend Cloud Email and Collaboration Security Worldwide

Sequitur Labs Announces EmPOWER SaaS Platform for Secure Lifecycle Management of IoT Devices (BusinessWire) Sequitur Labs Announces EmPOWER SaaS Platform for Secure Lifecycle Management of IoT Devices

Italian Banking Institution Creval Deploys Pluribus for Multi-site Data Center Network Modernization (Pluribus Networks) One of Italy’s largest financial institutions deploys Pluribus Adaptive Cloud Fabric™ solution powered by the Netvisor® ONE OS to automate network operations and enable a highly resilient, active-active data center architecture

Akamai Enables Organizations To Fight Fraud And Reduce Friction At The Edge With Account Protector (Akamai) New solution uses Akamai insight combined with behavioral analytics to shield users from account takeover

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Vulcan Cyber Introduces Risk Prioritization Based on Business Asset Security Posture (Vulcan Cyber) Use Vulcan Cyber for risk prioritization and asset health scoring to help your IT security teams drive remediation outcomes.

People

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