Ariel Picans, technology risk manager at Banco Delta, is responsible for overseeing the security posture of 400 endpoints and safeguarding the assets that reside both within the perimeter of the organization and in the cloud, ensuring that sensitive financial information, databases, and documents are secured against known and emerging threats. Once a year, Picans and his team conduct security checks and assessments of the infrastructure, creating vulnerability tests using various methods to make sure that alerts and filters are functioning properly. Over the years, Picans has been building out Banco Delta’s security infrastructure with solutions that, in his words, “add value and protect the bank’s environment from future attacks.” As a long-time McAfee customer,
Banco Delta was looking to upgrade to deepen and broaden protections and further simplify and consolidate security management. Additionally, Picans wanted to make sure that the bank was implementing the security controls required by compliance regulations and could provide detailed reports at audit time. McAfee Solutions Expand Security Options at Banco Delta Picans has always appreciated the advantages of the single-vendor, integrated approach offered by McAfee. Positive reviews from industry analysts like Gartner and Forrester, along with streamlined management, support, and communications prompted him to continue down the same path and explore the latest McAfee innovations, particularly McAfee® Endpoint Security 10.5 and McAfee ePO 5.9.1 software. Several years ago, Picans and his team relied on McAfee® VirusScan® Enterprise for strong antivirus and anti- malware. When he learned about McAfee Endpoint Security, Picans was impressed with the solution’s multilayered protection and made a decision to upgrade as a way of protecting Banco Delta against rapidly evolving threats. The solution provides not only antivirus but also encryption and integration with data loss prevention (DLP). McAfee Endpoint Security in collaboration with McAfee ePO software, McAfee® DLP Endpoint, the McAfee Network DLP solution, and McAfee® Network Security Platform enables him to create and enforce strict data access policies for devices both within and outside the four walls of the bank. The McAfee® Web Gateway appliance is also part of the ecosystem, using a host of techniques to analyze all web traffic and offering protection against malware and malicious code hidden through encryption.
To round out Banco Delta’s security infrastructure, Picans added McAfee® Enterprise Security Manager, a security and events management (SIEM) solution that integrates with all of the bank’s solutions. It uses advanced analytics to give Picans and his team context and to enable them to prioritize threats and assess risks. McAfee Enterprise Security Manager also centralizes and automates compliance monitoring and reporting, with pre-built dashboards, audit trails, and reports for more than 240 global regulations. “We migrated to McAfee Endpoint Security because it has opened up a wide gamut of options, all managed by a single console and a single agent. We’ve taken maximum advantage of this tool and have experienced very positive results. For all these reasons, we trust and count on McAfee security technology,” says Picans. A Collaborative Ecosystem with McAfee ePO at the Helm Since the upgrades, Picans has observed a noticeable reduction in both infections and in potentially compromising user behavior. The integration of McAfee® Threat Intelligence Exchange extends another layer of protection and speeds detection and response across the bank’s entire environment. McAfee Threat Intelligence Exchange shares threat intelligence from third-party sources and locally collected intelligence with other McAfee and third-party security solutions via the Data Exchange Layer (DXL) communications fabric. As Picans points out, all of the McAfee solutions in the bank’s integrated ecosystem can act immediately on this intelligence and swiftly block or quarantine threats. Banco Delta made a decision to add McAfee Threat Intelligence to its arsenal when Picans and his team detected an increase in usage of unauthorized applications. “Because of this, we needed a tool that provides information on whitelisted and a blacklisted applications. McAfee Threat Intelligence is the perfect solution because it provides us with visibility across the whole organization,” he says. Now Picans can customize data for his organization— including blacklists and whitelists of applications.
Reports generated by the McAfee ePO console provide an overview of executed applications—both authorized and unauthorized. This allows him to see whether somebody has been engaged in malicious or unauthorized activities. Picans and his team simply configure McAfee Threat Intelligence, let it run, and check reports on a daily basis. McAfee Solutions Keep Advanced Threats in Check and Prevent Disruption As the management hub for Banco Delta’s McAfee solutions, McAfee ePO software is integral to security operations. Picans relies on McAfee ePO software to ensure that every endpoint has antivirus and encryption, updated .DATs, and more. Picans and his team can also pull reports from the McAfee ePO dashboard with details like analysis and classification of malware by type, blocked malware, and devices that are most vulnerable to attack. Picans consolidates this information and provides the bank’s executive committee with a comprehensive view of
Banco Delta’s risk profile every month. He also finds this data useful for trend analysis. “The main benefit of this collaborative approach has been the reduction of the advanced malware and ransomware attacks that have been in circulation recently. Thanks to McAfee ePO software and our other McAfee solutions, we’ve been able to carry on without disruption, while other organizations have suffered from data breaches, putting their day-to-day operations at risk,” explains Picans. To protect against today’s continually morphing threats, Picans deployed McAfee® Advanced Threat Defense.
McAfee Advanced Threat Defense combines multiple powerful technologies—in-depth static code analysis, dynamic analysis through sandboxing, and machine learning—to help the bank accelerate detection of zero-day malware, evasive threats, and ransomware. In the first month of deployment at Banco Delta, McAfee Advanced Threat Defense proved its value by intercepting Locky, a prolific and persistent strain of ransomware that continues to reappear with new variants. Picans also uses McAfee Advanced Threat Defense to support security investigations. He points out that it has detected several malicious archives that were missed by solutions from other vendors. Picans submits these malware samples to McAfee Advanced Threat Defense to derive insights on indicators of compromise, which help him gain a better understanding of highly camouflaged threats. Since deploying these McAfee solutions, Picans has seen a significant reduction in attacks and data loss. Additionally, the integrated and connected McAfee ecosystem, with its single-console management through McAfee ePO software, has resulted in notable operational efficiencies as compared to a multivendor environment. “When you have a collection of unintegrated products with multiple management consoles, you need more people, and they need additional, highly specific training. McAfee has reduced the need for hiring additional personnel,” he affirms. “Plus, with its modular, centrally managed system, McAfee opens up a world of possibilities.” Stepping Up Security Across On-Premises, Virtualized, and Cloud Environments McAfee® Cloud Workload Security (CWS) will help increase Banco Delta’s visibility to elastic workloads in the public cloud and AWS (Amazon Web Service)/ VMware environments and will provide an integrated defense against advanced attacks. CWS with AWS is an example of how we can forge forward fearlessly in the cloud. McAfee® MOVE AntiVirus currently offers optimized security for virtualized desktops and servers. “I know that, with McAfee, I can count on having the same level of security in the cloud and in virtualized environments as we have on premises,” he notes. The bank currently has plans in the works to provide cloud-based services and applications for both external clients and internal stakeholders. When Banco Delta fully launches these cloud services, Picans and his team will be responsible for making sure all communications and data are encrypted and secure. For example, it will be really important to reassure the sales department that their information won’t be exposed and will be monitored regularly and that the bank’s databases won’t be compromised. “McAfee protects everything that’s online—not just within the network perimeter. The company’s advancements in cloud security and other innovations speak for themselves. It shows that McAfee is truly concerned about protecting its customers and that it strives to stay current with new technology trends and the evolving threat landscape,” summarizes Picans.