UPDATED 14:17 EDT / SEPTEMBER 15 2016

NEWS

BitSight raises $40M to help companies quantify their security risks

There’s much more to cybersecurity than just fending off attacks against a company’s internal infrastructure. Organizations must also keep a close watch on partners, suppliers and customers who may make them indirectly vulnerable to hacking, a task that BitSight Technologies Inc. is working to ease with the support of GGV Capital.

The venture firm today led a $40 million funding round into the startup that saw the participation of Comcast Corp., Singaporean telecommunications giant Singtel and nearly half a dozen other backers. BitSight will spend the cash on expanding sales efforts and developing new features for its namesake cloud service, which helps organizations find security risks lurking in their business ecosystems using real-time threat intelligence.

The platform continuously gathers data about breach attempts, exposed servers and other potential dangers from around the web to create a picture of the online security landscape. Every time a new threat is detected, built-in analytics algorithms identify what companies it affects and factors it into individualized security rankings that work similarly to consumer credit scores. The information is then exposed through a graphical interface that makes it possible to quickly check if an organization has an effective network protection strategy.

The potential use cases are numerous. Insurance providers, for instance, can use BitSight’s platform to determine if it’s financially worthwhile to cover a company against cyberattacks. And the everyday enterprises on the other end of the equation are able to assess their technology suppliers’ security postures. The service even includes an alerting mechanism that provides the ability to quickly notify a software supplier if their score starts slipping for whatever reason.

The broad appeal of its platform has enabled BitSight to land more than 450 enterprise customers since launch, including 60 Fortune 500 companies. Today’s funding will enable the startup to expand the list even further. As part of the effort, chief executive Shaun McConnon plans to hire 100 more staffers over the next 15 months with the goal of doubling his firm’s sales.

Image via Pixabay

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