Tech Firm Bets on Defence Centre to Counter Cyber Threats

 Internet Solutions has invested Ksh20 million in setting up a cyber threat intelligence centre to help companies monitor, analyze and respond to evolving cyber threats.

The cyber threat intelligence centre will help companies to develop a risk-based, proactive cyber resilience strategy to prevent, detect and respond to cyber-attacks within their IT environments. The company says it will invest an additional Ksh30 million in the next 12 months in expanding the facilities and hiring more cybersecurity engineers.

Cyberattacks are becoming coordinated and increasingly sophisticated, with cybercriminals targeting specific organisations, regions and customer profiles. To prevent potential financial, reputational and operational impairment occasioned by cyber threats and attacks, organisations are being compelled to implement early detection controls to safeguard their IT assets.

According to the Communications Authority’s quarterly report released in April this year, Kenya’s cybersecurity threats increased by 167% to 10.2 million from 3.8 million detected in the previous quarter. Within the same period, 12,197 cyber threat advisories were issued, marking a 91% increase from the advisories sent out to affected institutions in the previous quarter.

Speaking during the launch, Internet Solutions Head of Cyber Security Services Dr Bright Mawudor said cyber risk has become a major concern for businesses across all sectors and CIOs are under increasing pressure from boards to protect their organizations against evolving cyber threats even with strained budgets.

“We understand how expensive and complicated monitoring, analysis and response capabilities needed to keep businesses safe can be, especially with most companies being under pressure to do more with less.  Therefore, our cyber threat intelligence centre has been set up to help our clients to be cyber resilient in a cost-effective way,” he said.

The centre offers a broad range of cyber and managed services, including threat monitoring, threat intelligence, data protection and incident response as well as identifying potential gaps in security controls and identifying any unknown attackers on the network.

Kenya’s cybersecurity threats increased by 167% to 10.2 million.

Communication Authority

The cyber threat intelligence centre will provide a real-time cybersecurity service tailored to each company. He noted that understanding the risks to your business, and knowing who might attack you, and why, play a key role in preventing financial or reputational damage from a cyber incident.

According to Mawudor, there is no way to completely protect a business from a determined attacker, so it is critical to provide continuous monitoring to protect your organization.

Cyber Threat Intelligence (CTI) services help to inform an organization of potential and current cyber-attacks to their applications and infrastructure.