How Linnovate Partners Overcame Its Cybersecurity Growing Pains
Remember when network perimeters had clearly defined borders and fending off cyberattacks required little more than strong credentials?
Those days are behind us. Today’s threat actors are organized, sophisticated, and relentless. And in many cases, they no longer work alone — from criminal advanced persistent threat (APT) groups to state-sponsored black hats, attackers are taking an increasingly collaborative approach to their malevolent craft.
In our recent Global Threat Intelligence Report, we found that finance remains one of the most frequently targeted industries. This means that financial institutions are often among the first victims of new tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs). It’s an uncomfortable truth with which Samson Law, Linnovate Partners’ director of technology, is intimately familiar.
But it’s also one that he refuses to passively accept. Instead, when his organization sought to expand its operations, Law searched for a means by which it could remain secure against both new and existing threats.
The Power and Price of Innovation
Founded in 2016, Hong Kong-based Linnovate Partners is a leading innovator in the alternative investment scene. It provides its clients with an integrated suite of technology-enabled solutions and services geared toward the needs of asset and fund managers. Between its 10 global offices, the company provides administration services to over 600 funds, representing approximately $120 billion worth of assets.
As you might expect, this makes them a very compelling target for threat actors.
“At Linnovate, we believe that investing in digital capabilities to connect front- and back-office operations is the key to productivity and efficiency,” explains Law. “However, we also recognized that doing so would make us much more vulnerable to an attack. Cybercriminals are becoming increasingly sophisticated as they continually develop new techniques and tactics — we needed a way to protect ourselves and our clients.”
A Masterful Balancing Act
Alongside its digital transformation initiatives, Linnovate also sought to broaden its operations. Yet in so doing, it encountered a familiar set of obstacles.
As a financial services organization, Linnovate must adhere to strict industry regulations around data hygiene and security. At the same time, as an innovator in its space, Linnovate couldn’t afford to toss agility and productivity out the window. It needed to strike a balance between maintaining the responsiveness required for growth and providing ironclad protection for its digital assets and customers.
It was far from an easy task, but it was absolutely a necessary one.
“Data breaches and cyberattacks are some of our primary security concerns,” says Law. “They can cause significant financial loss, damage our reputation, and compromise the trust of our clients. We cannot afford to let that happen.”
Banking on BlackBerry’s Cylance Technology
Linnovate implemented several security initiatives to secure its growth:
- Multi-factor authentication
- Endpoint protection
- Strong encryption
- Regular third-party security audits
- Penetration testing
- A comprehensive incident response plan
Rounding out these forward-leaning initiatives was BlackBerry CylanceENDPOINT™, which combines self-defending artificial intelligence (AI) prevention with state-of-the-art detection and response capabilities. By helping identify and prevent attacks with less human intervention, CylanceENDPOINT enables an inherently proactive approach to cybersecurity. In addition, its agent technology is extremely lightweight, reducing overhead and allowing users to work unimpeded, and it works with equal efficacy even without an internet connection, scanning and detecting even zero-day exploits reliably, regardless of its connectivity to the cloud.
“We were impressed by BlackBerry’s reputation as a vendor, but also by the functionality of their software,” Law explains. “It provided us with all the functionality we required to meet IT administrator and industrial audit requirements, such as SOC 2 and ISAE 3402. BlackBerry also offered a range of other benefits, including access to their expertise and resources.”
Smart Finance, Smarter Security
After Linnovate cut ties with its previous endpoint detection and response (EDR) vendor, it saw significant improvements almost immediately. BlackBerry has since helped Linnovate enhance its security posture, confidently protect its sensitive data, and comply more easily with rigorous industry regulations. More importantly, it’s accomplished all of this without hindering Linnovate’s operations.
“CylanceENDPOINT has helped our organization support rapid expansion without putting sensitive information at risk,” concludes Law. “We trust BlackBerry for our security needs — to help us safeguard our assets and protect them against potential threats. We're confident that we'll see even further benefits from the platform.”
For similar articles and news delivered straight to your inbox subscribe to the BlackBerry Blog.
About Lisbeth Hansen
Lisbeth Hansen is Director, Influencer Relations, at BlackBerry.
