SafetyDetectives spoke with Dor Eisner, co-founder and CEO at Guardz, about what motivated him to establish Guardz, common threats faced by SMBs, the roles of MSPs and AI in cybersecurity, and more.
Can you talk about your background and what led you to start Guardz?
My security journey began 20 years ago when I served in the Israeli intelligence force in the 8200 unit, as an intelligence commander. This was back in the days when cybersecurity was new to the world, but we did a lot of it. Over the last 20 years, I have been involved in various cybersecurity roles, first as an expert for the government and then for the past decade as an entrepreneur for several startups in the cybersecurity space. The last company that we started was around 5 years ago, and it was recently acquired by Rapid7, a large US-based company.
We started Guardz (www.guardz.com) about a year ago with the vision to democratize cybersecurity for small businesses, and now we have a team of 25 people working to develop next-generation cybersecurity solutions for small businesses.
Can you talk about how Guardz differentiates itself from other cybersecurity companies? What makes it special?
Most cybersecurity solutions on the market today target the enterprise and mid-market segments. The majority of these solutions are point solutions, solving specific threats or targeting specific problems. We are building an all-in-one security stack for small businesses in a single platform, protecting against top attack vectors such as phishing, employee protection, malware, and other threats targeting small businesses. The beauty behind Guardz is that our platform detects and remediates threats in a user-friendly and cost-effective manner to help small businesses stay secure.
What are some of the standout features or services that you offer?
First, we perform digital asset discovery and external analysis of businesses, analyzing their security posture automatically. We then assess the business’s internal posture, including users in the cloud, SaaS applications, email security, device security, and employee culture. We also protect users’ browsing on the internet. Additionally, we offer insurance coverage on top of our security solutions, which is unique in the market. When customers choose Guardz, they get security and insurance coverage all in one solution.
Our automatic analysis of a business’s cyber posture includes:
- Users’ behavior
- Cloud data security
- SaaS applications usage and anomalies
- Email security from phishing and fraud
- Device security from ransomware and malware
- Building a culture of cyber awareness for employees
- Protecting the online browsing of users in real time
This all-in-one solution is very unique because in today’s cyber insurance market, if you want to get cyber insurance, you just go to the insurance broker. If you want to get security, you need to go to a security expert. We are solving both of these problems with the MSP (managed service providers) market. We are empowering them, the IT consultants of the world, to become security experts and to offer customers cybersecurity peace of mind,which is much needed at this time.
What are the most common cybersecurity threats that SMBs are facing today?
Small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) are facing social engineering, phishing, ransomware, and some fraud attacks. Most of the attacks targeting small businesses are coming from attacks-as-a-service tools.
On the dark web, there are many services available that sell attack-as-a-service. Cybercrime has created a new market against small businesses because in the past, threat actors usually targeted big companies. However, in recent years, the market has shifted towards democratizing tools such as attack-as-a-service and offering it for a few thousand dollars. This shift has created a new market where any criminal can become a cybercriminal in a matter of hours and start attacking small businesses at scale. This is why a solution like Guardz is essential to protect small businesses, which are the backbone of the economy and are struggling to secure their businesses.
How do you see the roles of MSPs evolving in the cybersecurity space?
Traditionally, Managed Service Providers (MSPs) have been the IT consultants and advisors for businesses. With the increasing necessity of cybersecurity in the last two years, customers have started asking about their business’s security, and MSPs have become the go-to security experts for small businesses. With Guardz, MSPs can efficiently and cost-effectively provide security services to their clients at scale. In the future, MSPs will continue to be the primary security experts for small businesses, and tools like Guardz will help them do so more efficiently.
How can artificial intelligence and machine learning be used to enhance cybersecurity?
AI is here, and it is going to change the technology world in general, and especially the cybersecurity world. We are already working on analyzing the remediation flow with AI. We started to develop it about a year ago when AI was still in the shadows. Now, as you know, AI is everywhere. Everyone knows about ChatGPT and other AI tools, but at the end of the day, AI is going to automate, and it’s already automating a lot of the remediation processes in the Guardz platform and helping the MSPs to support hundreds of customers with the power of automation. Therefore, I see AI as a crucial part of the future of cybersecurity, becoming the copilot, a security expert, of the MSP.