Eyal Benishti, CEO and founder of IRONSCALES, was gracious enough to sit for an interview with Safety Detective’s Aviva Zacks. She asked him why his company focuses on keeping us safe from phishing attacks.
Safety Detective: How did you get into cybersecurity?
Eyal Benishti: Computers and cybersecurity were my passions from a young age. By age 13, I was spending hours on the dial-up Internet in messaging boards on Bulletin Board Systems (BBS). I was also taking computer science courses in high school. Later, I got a bachelor’s degree in computer science and mathematics from Bar-Ilan University in Israel. Early in my career, I was a developer and tech lead, but I found my way into cybersecurity as a malware analyst. That led me to start IRONSCALES in 2014.
SD: I notice that IRONSCALES focuses on protecting the end-user from phishing. Why is this your company’s focus?
EB: Phishing attacks are becoming an epidemic affecting many people and companies; it is a tough problem to solve because there isn’t a silver bullet solution. However, artificial intelligence (AI) is helping us address cybersecurity in a more holistic way. Our platform combines the power of AI and machine learning with human intelligence from security operation center (SOC) teams to enable better email security incident response and decision making.
SD: What services does IRONSCALES offer to customers?
EB: IRONSCALES provides an AI-driven, self-learning email security platform that provides a comprehensive solution to stop tomorrow’s phishing attacks today. Using a decentralized threat protection network, the IRONSCALES platform accelerates the prevention, detection, and remediation of phishing attacks already inside the inbox with threat removal times in seconds, not minutes or hours.
SD: What cyberthreats should people be concerned about today?
EB: Employees need to be more careful about what they say and write online because the personal and sometimes their private information they post on social media could be exploited by a cybercriminal. Cybercriminals use this information to pose as a legitimate or trusted source to deliver sophisticated phishing campaigns. The end goal is to have someone download a file, click on a link, fill out a form, and provide confidential information to complete a transaction. These methods ultimately give the attacker access to enterprise business systems or enable them to execute malware and perpetrate fraud.
SD: How do you see cybersecurity developing in the next five years?
EB: Cybersecurity will go the same way other industries are going with the adoption of AI and machine intelligence. Today, many email security solutions require security operation center (SOC) teams to do a lot of manual work for incident response. Hundreds of thousands of mailboxes. The beginning of the autonomous future in email security is already here. AI is already assuming a major role in every aspect of cybersecurity—from prevention and detection to incident response and remediation.