Security Feature

For most companies, protecting computer systems begins and mostly ends with perimeter defense. Tools like firewalls, antivirus programs and the like all focus on keeping bad actors out of the system.  A new startup, enSilo, is looking to change that game by focusing more on preventing data tampering, and it's raised a hefty $21 million so far to advance that.

Since it started up 18 months ago, enSilo has seen some spectacular growth. With the newly-received funding, meanwhile—it recently completed the second tranche of Series A, which brought in around $9 million by itself—the company plans to step up its sales and marketing efforts, and improve its overall customer experience. Given that the company's product is proving quite popular so far, these are efforts that will likely be welcomed by the user base.

The product line enSilo offers, is built around a novel prospect: the company believes that it's impossible to stop network infiltration. The sheer amount of data breaches we've seen all over the news over the last couple of years bear that much out. So instead of putting more work into keeping unauthorized users out of the network, enSilo focuses on keeping them out of the data, preventing data tampering or theft.

Considering that enSilo's systems are currently at work in several Fortune 100 companies and defense contractors, that's a pretty hefty endorsement. Since enSilo can get to work right away without requiring a lot of learning periods or demanding a lot of system resources just to operate—the way firewalls and the like can sometimes—that's another endorsement.

A Gartner (News - Alert) report, the Magic Quadrant study for Endpoint Protection Platforms (EPP) notes that 44 percent of customers have been successfully compromised by using EPP systems. Serious vulnerabilities were found in major operations ranging from Kaspersky's Anti-Virus 2015 MR2 to AVG Internet Security.

This isn't to say that perimeter defense doesn't have a place; we shouldn't be just leaving the door open for anyone to wander in. However, it's important to note that it shouldn't be the only means of security on hand. We should not be saying to the hacker community, once you get through this gate, everything we have is yours. We should be protecting our systems both inside and out, investing in strong perimeter defenses, but also in internal data defense. No one who keeps a large amount of cash or jewels at home piles them on the coffee table and then locks the door; they keep such things hidden, in safes inside the house. This should be our response to data protection as well.

Protecting systems should not be limited to the outside only. We should be just as focused on protecting our systems internally as well. Tools like enSilo's should make a big difference in protecting against outside intrusion by making the data tougher to handle once it's been reached.