What does the Bit9 and Carbon Black merger mean for businesses?

MV: The funding was led by existing Bit9 investor Atlas Venture and included all other current Bit9 investors—.406 Ventures, Highland Capital Partners, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, and Sequoia Capital—and a direct investment by Blackstone, an investor in Carbon Black.

This funding will be used to accelerate our technology roadmap to stay ahead of the market and continue to deliver the most advanced threat protection solution available.

TRP: What will be your key USPs?

MV: Prevention. Detection. Response. Bit9 + Carbon Black will deliver a solution that provides all three in a single product. No other company on the market can say that.

TRP: What's the next step for Bit9 and Carbon Black?

MV: We've hit the ground running and we have no plans to slow down anytime soon. Next week, we will be announcing some exciting partnerships and technology integrations and shortly after that, we will be at the RSA Conference in San Francisco as a combined company, providing demos on our new product and meeting with industry leaders.

TRP: What are the key features of Carbon Black's incident response technology?

MV: Carbon Black is "always-on." The lightweight sensor continuously monitors and records every endpoint in the enterprise, giving security teams the ability to detect and respond to threats in seconds.

By maintaining a full recording of the data collected (the exact data needed during a response) security and IR teams are able to "roll back the tape" and immediately gather a complete understanding of an attack lifecycle, even if the attack occurred months ago.

TRP: Are enterprises doing enough to protect their endpoints and servers?

MV: Some are, most are not. Unfortunately, we've read too much in the news lately about organizations that are not adequately protecting themselves—and their customers.

It's our belief that advanced threat protection involves three key elements: prevention, detection and response. It's our goal to equip the market with everything it needs to protect every endpoint and server.
How critical is incidence response for the next generation of IT?

We do not hesitate to say that incident response is critical to the current generation of information security. Response is one of the three major components of the Bit9 + Carbon Black solution and it should not be overlooked by enterprises looking to improve their security postures.

Organizations that fail to prepare for the inevitable data breach will incur a recovery cost that could cripple their businesses. Preparing to respond, with the right kinds of data, is a key element of evolved security and may save a business hundreds of thousands of dollars when they are breached.