More Signal. Less Noise.

V4 | Issue 31 | 8.3.22

Thoma Bravo to acquire Ping Identity for $2.8 billion. Acronis raises $250 million.

Summary

By the CyberWire staff

At a glance.

Thoma Bravo to acquire Ping Identity for $2.8 billion.
Acronis raises $250 million.

Mergers and acquisitions.

Thoma Bravo is acquiring identity management firm Ping Identity for $2.8 billion and taking the company private. Seth Boro, a managing partner at Thoma Bravo, stated, "Ping Identity's unique capabilities and strong position in enterprise identity security make it a great platform to deliver customer outcomes, expand into new use cases and support digital transformations. We are highly impressed with the talented Ping Identity team and look forward to working collaboratively in the years to come."

Bot prevention company HUMAN Security (formerly White Ops) and identity fraud protection firm PerimeterX are merging under the HUMAN brand. The company stated, "With 77% of online security and fraud incidents being bot-based, the merger highlights the importance of identifying sophisticated bot attacks, fraud and account abuse before they impact enterprises across advertising, marketing, e-commerce and cybersecurity. The combined companies will comprise more than 450 employees under the HUMAN company name, 500+ customers and have more than $100 million in ARR."

UK-based IT firm Intechnica has spun off its cybersecurity unit Netacea as an independent company, Business Up North reports. Netacea's CEO Jeremy Gidlow stated, "Thanks to the support of our investors, Netacea looks forward to another year of explosive growth and innovation. It’s an exciting time for Netacea as we continue our growth into the US market, coupled with adding more experience to our senior leadership team."

Santa Clara, California-based Security Service Edge (SSE) provider Netskope has acquired zero-trust security company Infoit. The company stated, "As Netskope Borderless WAN, the addition of Infiot's revolutionary technology will enable Netskope customers to apply uniform security and quality of experience (QoE) policies to the widest range of hybrid work needs, from employees at home or on-the-go, to branch offices, ad-hoc point-of-sale systems, and multi-cloud environments."

Investments and exits.

Swiss cybersecurity firm Acronis raised another $250 million in funding earlier this year, Bloomberg reports. The funding brings the company's valuation to more than $3.5 billion.

Maryland-based cybersecurity training company Cybrary has raised $25 million in a Series C funding round led by existing investors BuildGroup and Gula Tech Adventures. The company says the funding "will be used to support additional company growth by bolstering research and development (R&D) across its engineering, product, and marketing teams as well as continuing to grow the new CybraryThreat Intelligence Group (CTIG)."

Executive moves.

Cohesity has appointed Sanjay Poonen as CEO and President.

ShiftLeft has named Stuart McClure as its new CEO. The company's founder and former CEO Manish Gupta will act as an advisor to McClure.

Avaya has appointed Alan Masarek as President and CEO.

Query.AI has appointed Matt Eberhart as CEO. Query's founder and former CEO Dhiraj Sharan will serve as the company's Chief Scientist.

Sigma7 has hired Jennifer Gold as Chief Technology Officer.

Cloud Security Alliance has named Troy Leach as Chief Strategy Officer.

Deep Instinct has appointed Carl Froggett as Chief Information Officer.

HackerOne has hired Ilona Cohen as Chief Legal and Policy Officer.

Snyk has hired Manoj Nair as Chief Product Officer.

Axonius has appointed Tom Kennedy as Vice President of Axonius Federal Systems.

Anomali has appointed Steve Benton as Vice President of Anomali Threat Research and General Manager of the Anomali Belfast, Ireland Office.

NetRise has added former Cylance CEO Stuart McClure to its board of directors.

Selected Reading

Marketplace

CRN® Honoring Jason Magee of ConnectWise in 2022 Top 100 Executives List in the Disruptors Category (GlobeNewswire News Room) Magee Makes Second Consecutive Appearance on List...

Thoma Bravo doubles down on identity; backer of Inspire Fitness and Spotter raises debut fund (PE Hub) Thoma Bravo agrees to take Ping Identity private for $2.8 billion.

CMA provisionally clears NortonLifeLock / Avast merger (GOV.UK) The CMA has provisionally cleared the anticipated acquisition of Avast by NortonLifeLock following an in-depth merger investigation.

With Google’s Mandiant deal pending, Microsoft looks to get ahead in security threat intelligence (GeekWire) Microsoft announced two new security threat intelligence products Tuesday morning, the latest moves in a broader effort to help businesses proactively sniff out and prevent cyberattacks. Built in part on… Read More

Check Point Q2 profit gains on 'healthy' cyber security demand (Reuters) Check Point Software Technologies beat estimates with a 2% gain in second-quarter profit, boosted by double-digit growth in revenue from products and subscriptions to protect cloud and other networks from escalating cyber attacks.

Singtel ups investment in corporate venture arm Innov8 to US$350m (Business Times) SINGTEL has announced that it will increase its capital commitment for corporate venture capital (CVC) arm Singtel Innov8 from US$250 million to US$350 million.

OSINT Foundation Launched by Former Intelligence Leaders (ClearanceJobs) Today is the official launch of the newly formed Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) Foundation.

How Cyber Chiefs Cut Through Marketing Noise (Wall Street Journal) Here are five strategies corporate security chiefs use to weed out unsuitable cyber providers.

Gartner Magic Quadrant PAM | Delinea Positioned as a Leader (Delinea) Download a complimentary copy of Gartner’s 2020 report on the PAM market and vendors to see why Delinea is recognized as a leader.

Cybersecurity Growth Investment Flat, M&A Activity Strong for 2022 (SecurityWeek) While global markets have suffered, sales of cybersecurity software have remained strong. VC investment in cybersecurity has adapted to the world economy rather than stalled.

Cyber Insurance Price Hike Hits Local Governments Hard (Pew Trusts) Some rates have more than doubled, and many insurers require new security protections.

Cyber insurance is on the rise, and organizational security postures must follow suit (VentureBeat) When it comes to cyber insurance, much like other types of insurance, organizations should know what to look for — as well as what is expected of them.

Cybersecurity Snapshot (May 2022) (Momentum Cybersecurity) We are pleased to provide you with Momentum’s Cybersecurity Market Review for 1H 2022. Strategic activity in the first half of the year included 679 transactions completed totaling $115.1B in deal value across M&A (148 transactions, $102.6B) and Financing (531 transactions, $12.5B).

Intechnica announces separation of cybersecurity business (Business Up North) Intechnica – the Manchester-based tech company – has spun off its cybersecurity arm Netacea as a standalone company.

NCSC launches startup incubator to protect against national cyber threats (IT PRO) The program is focused on the protection of highly available operational technology where there is a high risk of digital sabotage

Products, Services, and Solutions

Harness Security Testing Orchestration Module is Now Generally Available to Accelerate Secure Software Delivery (Harness.io) We’ve incorporated valuable end user feedback into several key new features, which we are now excited to announce with the General Availability (GA) of the Harness Security Testing Orchestration module.

Crowdstrike's threat hunting cloud tool launched (SC Magazine) Crowdstrike unveiled a new cloud-based threat hunting service named Falcon OverWatch Cloud Threat Hunting, SiliconANGLE reports. According to the company, Falcon OverWatch is designed to detect hidden, advanced threats that originate, persist or are operating in cloud environments, provides constant operations and support to avert breaches and other incidents and provides attack alerts as well as adversary tradecraft to disrupt these threats.

Claroty Unveils Cybersecurity Platform for Cyber and Operational Resilience (Claroty) New Claroty xDome empowers enterprises to both modernize and protect the continuity of the cyber-physical systems that sustain our lives

Raytheon Intelligence & Space Selects CrowdStrike to Offer Cybersecurity Customers Best-in-Class Endpoint Security (Raytheon Intelligence & Space) Raytheon Intelligence & Space, a Raytheon Technologies business, has entered into a partnership with CrowdStrike, a leader in cloud-delivered protection of endpoints, cloud workloads, identity and data, to integrate its complementary endpoint security products into RI&S’ Managed Detection and Response (MDR) service.

Pentagon’s secret communications network to get upgrade from Booz Allen (Defense News) “DISA has made clear that we will not forget that the ‘fight’ is fought on SIPRNet,” said Christopher Barnhurst, the agency’s deputy director.

Axis Raises the Bar with Modern Day ZTNA Service that Boasts Hyper-Intelligence, Simplicity, and 350 Global Edges (Axis Security) Axis Security, the leader in zero trust access, today announced their VPN Buyback Program which provides IT leaders with a simple, cost-effective way of replacing their existing VPN service in order to adopt zero trust network access (ZTNA).

Ex-footballer Strengthens Defensive Wall in Cybersecurity (SureCloud) SureCloud partners with Phoenix, Sport & Media (PSM) Group to help train professional sports players in cybersecurity.

CREST Defensible Penetration Test Released (PR Newswire) CREST, the international not-for-profit, membership body representing the global cyber security industry, has announced the release of its...

02.08.2022: DerScanner receives the CWE Compatibility MITRE certificate (DerScanner) DerScanner, an application code scanner, developed by DerSecur, has received the CWE Compatibility certificate from MITRE, an American non-profit organization. This certificate confirms the effectiveness of DerScanner in solving the problem of detecting vulnerabilities, classified by the CWE system, in the software code.

EnCompass Achieves Blue Diamond Partner Status with Datto, a Kaseya Company (EnCompass Iowa) The Midwest’s leading IT service provider scales and grows as it equips SMBs with top-of-the-line security and IT solutions CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa, August 1, 2022 -- EnCompass, a trusted computer and IT support vendor for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs)...

Established Cybersecurity Firm, TDI, Now Offers Managed Cybersecurity Performance Offering with Award-Winning Platform (TDI) At the recent World Credit Union Conference (WCUC) in Glasgow, Scotland, TDI unveiled their Managed Cybersecurity Performance (MCP) offering, its pinnacle body of work, summing up over two decades of delivering cybersecurity solutions across the globe.

New infosec products of the week: July 29, 2022 (Help Net Security) The featured infosec products this week are from:

Kaspersky, Saudi Technology Control to combat cyberattack (Arab News) Global cybersecurity firm Kaspersky has signed a strategic agreement with Technology Control Company, a security services, digital services and big data company in Saudi Arabia, at the @Hack Infosec Conference 2021. The managed security service provider agreement was marked at the conference, one of Saudi Arabia’s most anticipated information-security events of the year. The move is in line with Technology Control Company’s commitment to providing its customers in Saudi Arabia with enhanced managed security services.

Everything Blockchain Inc. Launches EB Control (Business Wire) Everything Blockchain Inc., (OTCMKTS: OBTX), a technology company that enables real-world use of blockchain to solve critical business issues, today a

Fastly Partners with HUMAN Security to Protect Customers from Bot Attacks and Fraud (Business Wire) Fastly Partners with HUMAN Security to Protect Customers from Bot Attacks and Fraud

Booz Allen partners with Acalvio on cyber deception (Consulting) Booz Allen Hamilton, a McLean VA-based management and technology consulting firm, has partnered with Acalvio to provide the Silicon Valley cybersecurity firm’s Shadowplex autonomous deception product

Digitate’s Intelligent AIOps Platform Achieves HIPAA and GDPR Compliance (Yahoo Finance) Digitate, a leading provider of SaaS-based autonomous enterprise software for IT and business operations, today announced that it has achieved both HIPAA and GDPR compliance, guaranteeing that its artificial intelligence for IT operations (AIOps) platform meets all regulatory standards for security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality, and privacy. The audits for both HIPAA and GDPR compliance were conducted by Deloitte Haskins & Sells, LLP.

SafeGuard Cyber integrates with Okta and Azure AD to automate identity-based responses for enterprises (Help Net Security) SafeGuard Cyber launched automated response and multi-channel user onboarding with Microsoft Azure AD and Okta integrations for its platform.

People

Troy Leach joins Cloud Security Alliance as Chief Strategy Officer (Help Net Security) Troy Leach joins Cloud Security Alliance as Chief Strategy Officer, reporting to the offices of the CEO and President.

Sigma7 Appoints Jennifer Gold as Chief Technology Officer (Yahoo) Global specialty risk services company Sigma7 announced Jennifer Gold's appointment as Chief Technology Officer. Ms. Gold will oversee all elements of Sigma7's back office and client facing technologies and data strategies, assure Sigma7 maintains industry-leading cyber security, and inform the company's cyber risk advisory and technology acquisition strategies. The addition of Ms. Gold to the rapidly scaling company will support Sigma7's efforts to revolutionize the client experience and elevat

Egnyte Solidifies Investment in India with New Head of India (Egnyte) Egnyte, the most secure platform for content collaboration and governance, today announced the appointment of Sachin Shetty as the Head of India, effective immediately. Shetty will lead all operations in the region, where Egnyte has more than 100 employees in engineering, product, and marketing.

Anomali Appoints Cyber Security Expert Steve Benton as Vice President and General Manager to Expand Growth of Anomali Intelligence-Driven Solutions (Business Wire) Anomali, a leader in intelligence-driven extended detection and response (XDR) cybersecurity solutions, today announced that Steve Benton has been app

Versa Networks Appoints DACH Region VP to Meet Accelerating Demand for Versa SASE (Telecom Reseller) Former Managing Director EU Central at Verizon Business, Pantelis Astenburg, joins Versa Networks to head up sales and support enterprises in the DACH region

Welcoming Manoj Nair: Snyk’s New Chief Product Officer (Snyk) We're thrilled to welcome Manoj Nair joins Snyk today as our new Chief Product Officer. In this pivotal phase of Snyk’s growth, Manoj will lead our global product team, setting our comprehensive product roadmap and strategy in both the short and long-term.

NetRise Welcomes Former CEO of Cylance to Board of Directors (NetRise) NetRise Welcomes Stuart McClure to Board of Directors

ShiftLeft Appoints Prevention-First, Cybersecurity Visionary and Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning Pioneer Stuart McClure as Chief Executive Officer (ShiftLeft) ShiftLeft, a disruptor and innovator in the world of DevSecOps and NextGen SAST and SCA, today named Stuart McClure as CEO.

Cohesity Appoints Sanjay Poonen as CEO and President (Business Wire) Cohesity, a leader in next-gen data management, today announced the appointment of Sanjay Poonen as CEO and President. He will also join the Cohesity

Query.AI Appoints Cybersecurity Industry Veteran Matt Eberhart as CEO (PR Newswire) Query.AI, the provider of the market's only security investigations control plane for modern enterprises, today announced it has named...

Meta Platforms announces COO Sheryl Sandberg's resignation (SeekingAlpha) Meta Platforms (META) announced that Sheryl Sandberg informed the company of her decision to resign from COO position, effective Aug.1, and will continue to serve on company board.She...

General Dynamics IT hires former assistant to DISA director (Washington Technology) The 35-year Army veteran retired from military service in the spring.

Alan Masarek joins Avaya as President and CEO (Help Net Security) Avaya Holdings appoints Alan Masarek as its President and CEO and as a member of Avaya’s Board of Directors, effective August 1, 2022.

Axonius Appoints Tom Kennedy as Vice President of Axonius Federal Systems (Axonius) Axonius today announced it has appointed Tom Kennedy as its Vice President of Axonius Federal Systems LLC, the company’s government-focused subsidiary.

HackerOne Scoops Up Aledade Legal Chief Ilona Cohen (Corporate Counsel) Cohen said she's been a fan of HackerOne since it launched #HackThePentagon in partnership with the Department of Defense in 2016. Now, she'll lead its legal and public policy efforts.

Deep Instinct hires Carl Froggett as CIO (Help Net Security) Deep Instinct announced the addition of Carl Froggett to its executive leadership team as Chief Information Officer.