Why I Joined IRONSCALES

This week I joined IRONSCALES as the SVP of Product Management. Given my background in cybersecurity and enterprise software, I always thought of email security and phishing as a problem that was already solved. I didn't realize how much I was off.

But it is much more than that. IRONSCALES was the best fit for me, for multiple reasons:

1. Do good

About 10 years ago, I vowed to myself to only join tech companies with a clear intention of doing good. I want to spend my time making a positive impact while contributing to making the online world a safer place. Bad actors will always be there and will keep on finding new ways to steal, damage and commit cybercrimes. I want to do as much as I can to stop them.

This is the reason I joined the founding team of MyPermissions in 2012 (MyPrivacy today), to allow every person to regain control over his/her personal information online and joined WhiteSource in 2017, to allow any organization use open source freely and securely.

IRONSCALES is the next natural step in my journey, as they are helping organizations collaborate and communicate freely and securely, preventing the most sophisticated modern email-based attacks.

While phishing, ransomware, account takeover and identify theft incidents are in the news daily, it wasn’t until I started hearing numerous stories from friends about how they have been attacked that the problem really hit home for me.

As an anecdote, right before joining IRONSCALES, I took a motorcycle trip in Greece with ten fellow riders. I can write a whole post about it (I’ll save that story for another day). During a break on our ride, I was talking with one of the other riders about my new job and how exciting it is. He couldn’t help it and told me how his business (a computer network equipment distributor in Israel) was compromised by an email asking one of his VPs to change the wire transfer account details for one of his suppliers. He thought that by having a traditional email security solution and trusting his email cloud provider that he would be safe. Unfortunately, that proved not to be the case, and the $30k that was transferred to the fake account was lost to the attackers forever.

2. Solving a huge problem

Report after reports confirms that email and messaging platforms are the main attack vector for cyber attacks. The main breed, BEC (Business Email Compromise) generated losses of $1.8B just in in 2020.

Attackers are becoming more and more sophisticated, utilizing various techniques to penetrate organizations. COVID-19 accelerated the rate and size of attacks. As shutdowns spread across the globe last year, organizations of all sizes scrambled to move quickly to the cloud and to begin using their cloud provider’s email and collaboration capabilities. The criminals took notice and modified their attack methods to go after these users. Employees are the most sought-after target for cyber attacks.

On the defense, SOC analysts and other security team members are simply being overwhelmed by the sheer number of phishing incidents their companies are facing. The huge shortage of cybersecurity talent does not make the situation any better.

In the new cloud-first reality of operation, legacy email security technologies like SEGs (Secure Email Gateways) simply cannot detect or block modern types of phishing attacks.

3. The right time

The messaging security market is shouting for disruption.

It requires a new type of solution to fight these sophisticated attacks.

Organizations need and deserve a solution that detects and blocks these advanced phishing attacks, can identify zero-days and polymorphic attacks, but most importantly, allow them to do it with their current cybersecurity workforce.

Applying innovative mailbox-level protection that utilizes ML (machine learning) and AI (artificial intelligence) creates a self-learning system that protects organizations from attacks both today and into the future.

This is where IRONSCALES come into play. The market has changed. Customers and service providers understand it and have embraced these new solutions.

4. The right team

IRONSCALES has been in operation since 2014. It is uncommon to find as passionate and determined founder as Eyal. I first met Eyal in 2016 when IRONSCALES was tiny company and was only focused on phishing SAT (Simulation and Training). Eyal already knew back then that he wanted to create a company and a solution focused on providing customers with a next-generation email protection solution. We kept in touch over the years and I watched as his vision became reality.

As the solution grew in capabilities and maturity, the company needed to bring in a strong leadership team to take IRONSCALES to the next level. Over the last year the company has brought in a very strong executive team which I’m very proud to now be a part of. Erez, Lomy, Matt, Tristan, Alex, Lior and Julia: I'm looking forward to learning from you and having a fun and mutually successful ride.

5. The right product

The IRONSCALES solution is a great combination of a modern anti-phishing solution that includes an ATP, an M-SOAR and a phishing simulation and training platform.

More than that, it employs sophisticated multi-tier AI/ML algorithms to detect mailbox-level anomalies. But the best part is Themis, an AI-powered virtual security analyst that makes the investigation process fast and incredibly accurate.

Customers love IRONSCALES. As one of the recent reviews on Gartner peer insights put it: "simple yet powerful anti-phishing solution." The product is also the highest rated in the category with a 4.9/5 stars across dozens of reviews.

6. The right vision

IRONSCALES is a true leader in email security. We are now in a challenge to expand and fully automate detection and remediation of phishing across all messaging platforms, protecting organizations from the weakest link, the human factor.

IRONSCALES has everything needed to make the world a safer place and fight bad actors: disruptive technology, amazing product, domain expertise, a great team and a great product.

But don’t just take my word for it. Based on all the awards IRONSCALES has received in just 2021 alone, I would say the market agrees.

I can’t wait to help organizations of all sizes with securing their email and collaboration platforms.

David
Connect on Twitter: @davidhabusha