Kaspersky is a multinational cybersecurity provider that develops and sells antivirus, internet security, password management, endpoint security, and other cybersecurity products and services. Emad Haffar, Head of Technical Experts, Kaspersky talks to The Integrator on the comprehensive protection solutions offered by the company to enterprise customers.

Speak about Kaspersky’s capacities to offer comprehensive protection for enterprise businesses in times of rising cyber-attacks:

The Kaspersky Expert Security Framework demonstrates our capabilities and strength as an industry leader in the cybersecurity realm. The Framework is a comprehensive solution that connects the three pillars pivotal to any successful cybersecurity strategy to face the full spectrum of today’s complex threats, APT-like, and targeted attacks. Our Expert Security Framework allows us to equip an organization’s cybersecurity team with cut-throat technology, backed by superior intelligence, capabilities, and expert guidance to run their ship on full power. The solution also allows us to study each customer and understand the length and breadth of their cybersecurity needs according to their size, industry, and the data they hold.

 

What advice do you give to enterprises to secure their network and reduce vulnerabilities?

First, an enterprise must understand the needs of a cybersecurity strategy and it can carry out a cybersecurity audit of their networks and remediate any weaknesses discovered in the perimeter or inside the network. The organization can proceed further with the following:

• Deploy advanced cybersecurity controls, to enable the discovery of sophisticated and unknown threats
• Facilitate investigations and allow timely remediation and response with tools such as anti-APT and EDR solutions among others
• Provide their staff with basic cybersecurity awareness training on phishing or other social engineering techniques.

SMEs face large-scale cyber threats than large enterprises. How can they defend their physical and cloud networks? What solutions does Kaspersky offer to protect their digital ecosystem?

For SMEs as well as large enterprises, we have the Kaspersky Security Foundations, which provides high-level visibility and unparalleled protection to everything connected to the network and the cloud. It provides any organization, regardless of their size, all they need to have a robust layer of fully automated detection tools. This covers the on-premise and off-premise (cloud) workloads. In addition, we have solutions like the Kaspersky Hybrid Cloud, Kaspersky Endpoint Security Cloud, Kaspersky Security for Internet Gateway, and Kaspersky Security for Mail Server – they make cyber protection borderless.

Elaborate on Kaspersky’s business strategies in the Middle East and the verticals you focus

When it comes to verticals, the financial sector has always been on our radar because cybercriminals are motivated by monetary gains. With countries in the GCC heavily supporting smart city investments, attacks on critical infrastructure are also gaining steam, particularly in the Oil & Gas sector, which is one of the mainstay economic sectors for the region. In tandem, the government sector is also most exposed to wide-scale APT attacks because of the classified, sensitive information they store. Lastly, cyberattacks on the healthcare sector are also on the rise because of certain systems in use that are incompatible with new upgrades, as well as data. In simpler terms, anything to do with finance and data easily draws attention from cybercriminal gangs.

How do you react to the increasing competition in the security solutions market?

There are many brands in the market, but with over 24 years of expertise and over 400 million customers, we stand strong and more capable in doing what we do best – protect our customers and what they value the most. Most importantly, our “cyber immune” approach helps us stand out. Kaspersky “cyber immunity” can help organizations build IT systems that are inherently secure and safe.