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Sophos, a top next-generation cybersecurity firm has acquired SOC.OS, an innovator of a cloud-based security alert investigation and triage automation solution. 

The solution consolidates and prioritizes high volumes of security alerts from multiple products and platforms across an organization allowing security operations teams to quickly understand and respond to the most urgent cases flagged. 

Sophos has been  in Kenya for more than 15 years through Mart Networks Group, its distributor. In the years of its stay in the country, Sophos has played a major role in securing most regional organizations that have undergone various technological transitions and cybercrimes. 

“Since ransomware attacks don’t respect any boundaries, Kenya is not an exception. Ransomware continues to be one of the biggest cybersecurity concerns and these attacks are evolving all the time,” said Moiz Maloo, MD, Mart Networks Group.

According to the recently published Sophos 2022 Threat Report, the evolution of ransomware attacks has become more service-based and targeted, attackers are turning to additional extortion methods, such as stealing data and threatening to publish or sell this data to aggressive calling employees, putting pressure on their victims to pay.

 Sophos researchers predict that in one year, a greater proportion of ransomware attacks will be based on ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) offerings, with specialist ransomware developers focused on creating and then leasing their malicious code and infrastructure to third-party affiliates. 

With SOC.OS, Sophos plans to advance its Managed Threat Response (MTR) and Extended Detection and Response (XDR) solutions for organizations of all sizes. SOC.OS will also help Sophos expand its Adaptive Cybersecurity Ecosystem. This will include providing alerts and events from third-party endpoint, server, firewall, Identity and Access Management (IAM), cloud workload, email, and mobile security products.

Joe Levy, the chief technology and product officer from Sophos appreciates the technology that SOC.OS brings on board.

“SOC.OS will provide our Adaptive Cybersecurity Ecosystem with a broader set of third-party telemetry . It also has an impressive list of integrations that will benefit Sophos customers as we continue to expand and develop industry-leading XDR and MDR capabilities,” Levy  said. 

With cyberattacks, such as ransomware, becoming increasingly prevalent and complex, security operations teams are under constant pressure to monitor every aspect of their organization. Between 24/7 threat activity, high volumes of security alerts and false positives, and understaffing, organizations need XDR or MTR, and an extra solution, such as SOC.OS, that automatically clusters and triages alerts. 

Dave Mareels, chief executive officer and co-founder of SOC.OS says that the dynamics of the tech industry and ever evolving threat makes it necessary for firms to find new and modern ways of combating cyberattacks.

“Alert fatigue and lack of visibility still plague security teams worldwide. Considering this, against the backdrop of constantly changing cyberthreats and a challenging talent landscape, defenders need new and innovative products and services that can help them solve more complex incidents in less time,” Mareels said.

SOC.OS was  launched in 2020 and is a spinout of BAE Systems Digital Intelligence. The company is privately held and based in Milton Keynes, U.K.