Internet Access Protection System Blocks Social Engineering and Phishing Attacks by Putting a Human-like Machine Against Attackers

PLEASANTON, Calif., Nov. 7, 2017 – SlashNext, provider of
third-generation Internet security solutions, today announced
the company’s broad market release of the SlashNext Internet
Access Protection System to protect organizations from cross
platform social engineering and phishing, malware, exploits
and callback attacks. The system goes beyond first generation
signature-based and second generation sandbox-based
technologies and deploys human-like intelligence and cognitive
thinking to stop these Internet attacks targeting unsuspecting
employees as their entry points.
Today, automatic software updates and enhanced security
offered in modern browsers prevent most software exploits
such as buffer overruns and privilege escalations, but social
engineering and phishing attacks exploit human vulnerabilities
by deceiving victims into taking actions that will breach their
company and their connected client’s networks. In fact, social
engineering and phishing attacks are the fastest growing
security threat for organizations today, representing 43% of
all Internet access threats, nearly double that of malware
and viruses, according to the Verizon Data Breach Digest.
“Social engineering and phishing attacks are becoming the
prime attack vector since cyber-criminals realize unsuspecting
people create the easiest way to bypass traditional anti-virus
and sandbox technologies,” said Fran Howarth, Senior Analyst
with Bloor Research. “A new approach to Internet threat
detection is needed. SlashNext answers that need, using
cognitive computing technologies that mirror human learning
to enable systems to stop Internet threats targeting a variety
of operating systems such as Windows, Linux, OSX, Android
and iOS.”
“For years, we’ve relied on a well-defined boundary to protect
our assets, but things are changing. With the rapid pace of
change in modern advanced threats, employees cannot be
expected to evaluate a particular threat’s risk, and information
security teams are hard-pressed to stay abreast of all new
threat information and rethink their security approach,”
said Raun Nohavitza, vice president of IT at Centrify. “To
address this challenge, we deployed the SlashNext Internet
Access Protection System. It allows us to apply broad threat
intelligence and the cumulative expertise of seasoned security
experts to automatically block malicious activity that would
otherwise reach our employees.”
In a recent review of more than 50 deployments, SlashNext
identified dozens of instances of zero-day social engineering
and phishing, exploits and malware attacks that had gone
undetected by the customers’ existing firewalls, sandbox,
data-exfiltration prevention tools and next gen anti-virus
software.
“The ever-changing threat landscape we face today requires
a revolutionary approach to security — one that is built upon
an entirely new mindset that is beyond and independent of
existing technologies that we’ve seen,” said Promod Haque,
Senior Managing Partner of Norwest Venture Partners.
“SlashNext represents the next generation of security through
its unique ability to think outside the sandbox.”
The SlashNext solution is deployed via a simple, 20-minute
installation process that requires zero policy configuration
or ongoing maintenance. Once installed, the system employs
a patent pending threat protection technology that includes:
A cross platform protocol analysis engine that processes
gigabits of Internet bound traffic in real-time to extract
a complex set of artifacts. These artifacts are essentially
the telltale signs of a malicious attack
The artifacts are further processed by a cognitive computing
machine that uses massive cloud computing power to
convert these features into clear Indicators of Compromise
(IOCs)
The IOCs are then handed over to hundreds of reasoning
engines that behave like a team of decision-makers
working together to reach a single verdict, “100% Malicious”
or “Not Malicious”
Once a decision is made, the final outcome is shared back
with all the decision makers as part of a peer feedback
mechanism that gives the system its unique self-learning
capability. This process is a huge contrast to machine
learning based systems that need to be manually trained
repeatedly by data scientists and an exact replication of
a team of human threat researchers who process raw
data, compile evidence, analyze using cognition, discuss
and then collectively reach a decision.
“The last few years have seen an explosion of social engineering
and phishing attacks that don’t rely on malware or exploits
to penetrate defenses. That’s left businesses urgently in
need of an innovative new approach to security that goes far
beyond the sandbox,” said Gaurav Garg, Founding Partner of
Wing Venture Capital. “By harnessing the power of cognitive
computing in its system, SlashNext is taking cyber defense
to a completely new level.”
Availability
The SlashNext Internet Access Protection System is available
immediately in North America via a subscription-as-a-service
model that includes product support and built in threat
intelligence.
Blog by CEO Atif Mushtaq: www.slashnext.com/blog
SlashNext Press Release, November 7, 2017 © All Rights Reserved, SlashNext, Inc. 01
About SlashNext
SlashNext has reinvented Internet threat prevention systems
with a new approach to protecting users and systems every
time they connect to the Internet.
The SlashNext Internet Access Protection System leverages
cognitive computing, a process that mimics how the human
brain senses, reasons and responds to stimulus, to process
and detect complex and interlinked Internet access attacks
including social engineering and phishing, malware, exploits
and callbacks.
SlashNext CEO Atif Mushtaq founded the company after
serving nine years as a senior scientist for FireEye, where
he was a leading architect of the company’s core malware
detection system based on signatures and sandbox based
technologies. Atif has been at the forefront in the fight against
cybercrimes and has worked with law enforcement and other
global organizations to take down some of the world’s biggest
cyber crime networks. In 2012, his efforts took down one of
the largest email spam networks operating out of Russia,
causing the worldwide spam level to drop by 50% in a single
day.
SlashNext received $9 million in Series A funding in April
from Norwest Venture Partners and Wing Venture Capital.
Norwest Venture Partners has a track record of investing
in cutting edge cyber security companies including FireEye,
the maker of world’s first sandbox based malware detection
technology.
To learn more about SlashNext and to keep up on the latest
news, visit: www.SlashNext.com and follow @slashnextinc
on Twitter.
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