Enterprise Security Blog

The $2500 SIEM

This isn't a misprint - for as little as $2500 per month you can take the first step that all companies with effective security have taken to comply with standards and protect critical information. Intellitactics and Quest have put together a great program - security as a service -  to get you to take the first step. 

There are many reasons that companies and agencies have deferred their SIEM projects: the budget got smaller, the project was cut, we lost the headcount, we had to cut the SIEM project to save jobs in our group, we like maintaining the log collector we built, the dog ate it (the budget that is).

How did your project get stalled, postponed or shelved indefinitely? Every project requires human capital and sometimes you're just short one set of hands. Sometimes the best person, most qualified person is engaged in another high priority project. Budgets do change. Dollars shift to other projects, budgets get smaller in one area to compensate for unavoidable increases in other areas and revenue projections that fund the budget fall short of  expectations.Unfortunately the need for effective logging and event management doesn't shift and what the company expects from you - the security team - doesn't get put on hold. 

For $2500 you get Intellitactics SAFE- the only SIEM appliance with all the capabilities on one appliance sitting right where you are. Then you decide how much you can do with your SIEM - some of the work, all the work or none of the work at night or weekends. You get a trusted partnership with Quest,a full service managed security service provider. With Quest's security as a service you can do as little or as much work as you choose by augmenting your staff with Quest - using Quest to add the most value. 

SIEM is established by SANS as an important first stepin developing an efficient and effective security startegy. It reduces the cost of compliance, mitigates risk by automating monitoring of controls that enforce policy. 

For more information on security as a service  visit www.intellitactics.com or your virtual security team visit www.questsys.com   

Intellitactics SAFE Powers Up for NERC Compliance

An online publication reported that the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) has approved a set of revised cyber-security standards for the North American bulk power system. NERC is an international self-regulatory authority for ensuring the reliability of the bulk electric power system in North America. It develops and enforces reliability standards, and under the Energy Policy Act of 2005, it has the power to fine violators for standards violations.

The 88% majority approval by the electric industry indicates strong support in the industry for the more stringent standards. "The approval of these revisions is evidence that NERC's industry-driven standards development process is producing results, with the aim of developing a strong foundation for the cyber security of the electric grid," said Michael Assante, Vice President and Chief Security Officer at NERC, in a statement.  “The standards, if properly implemented, will develop the capabilities needed to secure critical infrastructure from cyber security threats," the statement noted.

The revised standards define 40 requirements that, when implemented, will provide a solid foundation of sound security practices. Audits for compliance with these comprehensive requirements will begin on July 1, 2009. Entities that fail to comply can be fined up to $1 million per day, per violation in the U.S., with other enforcement provisions in place throughout much of Canada, said NERC.

Being audit ready requires automated log collection and reporting. Intellitactics SAFE offers one fully capable appliance that not only provides audit worthy NERC reports to demonstrate compliance but also automates event monitoring to sustain compliance between audits. Monitoring is a proven strategy for mitigating risk and protecting against costly breaches in security. See SAFE every Tuesday and decide is SAFE is right for you.

Intellitactics Explains the Value of ONE

21 - the number of vendors offering security information and event management (SIEM) products including Intellitactics. These products offer a variety of features and functions and just as many architectural approaches to providing these product capabilities. So what is so important about ONE?

ONE is the number of appliances you'll need to enjoy a FULLY CAPABLE SIEM from Intellitactics. That means you buy and implement ONE appliance that provides TWO key capabilities: log management which is essential for compliance with regulatory standards and real time event management which is essential for threat management and security operations.

Another number to consider: 1400! That's the number of packaged reports you get with the Intellitactics SIEM products.1400 audit ready reports for every regulatory standard:  NERC, PCI, HIPAA, SOX, FISMA, GLB and for best practice control sets like CoBit, NIST and ISO.

Finally - 0 - yes ZERO is the number of DBA's you'll need and the amount of SAN storage you will need to get full value from your Intellitactics SIEM. It's also the number of times you'll wish you had bought another product and the number of calls you'll have to make complaining that you've run out of storage or connected to a device your SIEM doesn't support.

So get the ONE SIEM appliance that does it all. See the ONE every Tuesday at 2 PM EST.