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Cyber attacks are all the rage: more data is getting stored on the cloud, more of our work is going mobile, and more people are bringing their own devices to the office. In the meantime, cyber attacks from hacktivist networks like Anonymous are continuing, and mysterious state-backed entities continue to propagate malware like the Flame virus. Amidst all that vulnerability likes some compelling investments that venture capitalists are, naturally, taking advantage of.
Bit9, a Waltham, Mass.-based company that provides enterprise application whitelisting and aims to prevent cyber attacks from happening, just raised $34.5 million in its fourth round of investment from a group of venture capital firms led by new investor Sequoia Capital, its biggest funding round to date.
Bit9, which counts Atlas Venture, Highland Capital Partners and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers as existing investors, said it would use the new money to fund new products and expand its sales and marketing efforts. The company bills itself as the next-generation solution to advanced persistent threats (or APTs in cyber-security speak) like Flame, a recent example of state-backed malware, also known as a cyber-attack toolkit, that surreptitiously collected private data from several countries in the Middle East. Bit9 points out that Flame evaded traditional security solutions, including "43 different antivirus, host-based intrusion prevention systems."
The company also cited recent research as finding that 59% of enterprises are "certain or fairly certain" that they've already been the target of an advanced persistent threat. Some big names crop up on the cyber-victim list of 2012, including Sony, Hyundai, LinkedIn, eHarmony, Exxon Mobil, American Airlines and Yahoo!, while the median cost of cyber-crime for 50 surveyed companies was $5.9 million, according to the Ponemon Institute.
Bit9 claims it was the only security company to announce it had successfully stopped the Flame malware and last year's RSA breach "long before they were identified by traditional/legacy antivirus companies."
"This latest round of funding is the largest in the company's history and underscores the support Bit9 has received from investors who understand the changing nature of the security market," said Bit9's CEO Patrick Morley. "It places a bet squarely on our vision and technology."
