CI Security announced it has partnered with Ednetics to help schools with information security monitoring. And the company raised its Series B funding round recently.Bremerton, Washington-based Managed Detection and Response (MDR) cybersecurity services company CI Security announced this week that it has partnered with Post Falls, Idaho-based Ednetics in order to make it easier for schools and universities to receive 24×7 information security monitoring, threat detection, and response for education networks. Ednetics is considered a leader in technology and physical security solutions for education and government customers.
Through the partnership, CI Security and Ednetics are going to provide Managed Detection and Response (MDR) with innovative security solutions built for education. The partnership evolved from a shared mission to support critical services in their local communities.
Ednetics and CI Security are bringing purpose-built solutions in order to ensure every aspect of network infrastructure is managed and secured within schools. Plus the partnership will accelerate the opportunity to support nearly 730,000 students in over 1,500 schools with comprehensive information security services.
“School networks are prime targets for unauthorized disclosure of records, theft, and service disruption for the purpose of extortion,” said CI Security CISO and founder Michael Hamilton. “Ednetics and CI Security want to ensure schools take a comprehensive approach to addressing network security risks and demonstrating auditable compliance with COPPA, FERPA, and emerging privacy legislation.”
Through CI Security’s MDR and Ednetics’ procurement vehicles, their education customers can easily purchase their solutions through a streamlined procurement process for the educational sector. And the cost and bureaucracy associated with purchasing security solutions have been reduced greatly as a result.
“The true value of this partnership is how our companies work together to provide managed detection and response,” added Ednetics Network director Brandon McCoy. “With our commitment to state-of-the-art technologies, CI Security is a proven partner in helping our customers find cyber threats and manage the risks associated with information security compromises. Excellent security requires a unified team of experts ready to respond anytime—we can now extend that team of experts to our customers with CI Security.”
This news comes on the heels of CI Security announcing it raised $9.6 million in Series B last month. With the funding, CI Security said it was going to expand upon its mission to defend critical services in healthcare and the public sector. The Series B round of funding was led by East Seattle Partners — which is a multi-asset investment firm that was founded by Alan Frazier.
“Organizations spend $96 billion annually on security technologies but the headlines persist. There is no silver bullet technology solution that can eradicate the risk of a cyber attack,” added CI Security CEO Garrett Silver in a statement about the funding. “Security is not a technology problem, it is a people problem. There is a material shortage of security talent, and organizations cannot recruit and retain enough people to manage the technology they already have. Our managed detection and response solution uses technology to enable Critical Insight analysts to extend our customers’ teams. We take the operational burden of detection and response so our customers’ few, precious resources can get back to their day job: moving forward on their organization’s security maturity journey.”
The additional funding will also allow CI Security to continue expanding its Critical Insight Managed Detection and Response (MDR) service. And customers with Critical Insight MDR can detect and respond to intrusions and threats quickly.
Critical Insight MDR is able to monitor digital assets where customers have them whether it is on premises, AWS or Azure cloud, and Microsoft Office 365. And Critical Insight MDR is designed to spot attacks on IoT devices including connected medical devices along with operational technologies (OT) in water, energy, manufacturing, and transportation sectors in a regulatory compliant fashion.
At every Critical Insight Security Operations Center, each customer has a CI Success Engineer. And each location has a dedicated security advocate with a deep understanding of the customer’s specific needs and critical assets. That CI Success Engineer serves as the central communication point for customers while CI Security Analysts leverages best-in-class technology for investigating threats around-the-clock.
CI Security sources analysts from the military, technical colleges, and universities especially ones who are involved in the PISCES program. Hamilton is a founder of PISCES — which is a program that partners with multiple universities and allows the CI Security to provide security monitoring for down-market local governments at no charge. Through the program, students get to learn infrastructure protection and job skills.
