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Cyber security vendor Sophos has acquired US-based start-up Braintrace to ramp up its network detection capabilities.
Founded in 2016, Braintrace provides visibility into organisations’ suspicious network traffic patterns through its remote network packet capture (RNCAP).
The terms of the deal were not disclosed. If approved, Thoma Bravo-owned Sophos will integrate Braintrace’s teams into its Managed Threat Response (MTR) and Rapid Response divisions.
According to Sophos, the Braintrace technology will also serve as the launchpad to collect and forward third-party event data from firewalls, proxies, virtual private networks (VPNs), and other sources.
These additional layers of visibility and event ingestion will significantly improve threat detection, threat hunting and response to suspicious activity, the vendor said.
“You can’t protect what you don’t know is there, and businesses of all sizes often miscalculate their assets and attack surface, both on-premises and in the cloud,” said Joe Levy, chief technology officer at Sophos.
“We’re particularly excited that Braintrace built this technology specifically to provide better security outcomes to their Managed Detection and Response (MDR) customers. It’s hard to beat the effectiveness of solutions built by teams of skilled practitioners and developers to solve real-world cyber security problems.”
Sophos said it will deploy Braintrace’s NDR technology as a virtual machine, fed from traditional observability points such as a Switched Port Analyser (SPAN) port or a network Test Access Point (TAP) to inspect both north-south traffic at boundaries or east-west traffic within the network.
The latest deal comes less than a month after Sohos also acquired Capsule8 to overhaul its protection of Linux systems through its own offerings.
Acquired for an unknown sum, that acquisition will see Sophos integrate Capsule8 technology, which is aimed at Linux cyber security, to its Adaptive Cybersecurity Ecosystem to provide Linux server and cloud container security later in the fiscal year.
