Business Need
- Identify and mitigate potential zero-day threats in running workloads
- Improve response times to address new vulnerabilities or security incidents
- Track and present on risk progress to leadership
Company Overview
Founded in 2015, Network is a data- and AI-driven VMS platform purpose-built to transform the way frontline industries — such as education, healthcare, hospitality, and retail — manage contingent labor. The company offers a comprehensive, centralized solution that benchmarks vendor performance in real time, optimizes temporary staffing spend, and automates compliance-related workflows.
Challenges
Seeing Through the Gaps
As a leading provider of AI-powered workforce solutions, Network routinely handles sensitive data across various sectors. This data ranges from personal information to financial and health details, making security paramount. Safeguarding this data against both malicious attacks and inadvertent exposure is crucial. Any breach could not only undermine customer trust, but also expose a company to regulatory penalties.
Network recognized this need and consequently employed a wide range of security tools to scan runtime images before deploying them into production clusters. Several years ago, however, it became evident that Network’s security posture required enhancement.
“We needed a tool to give us runtime visibility and detection,” said Peter Du, CISO at Network. “We had the ability to detect issues with inactive container images, but no way of addressing real-time threats and vulnerabilities. We had a gap there — and we needed to close it.”
A lack of tooling wasn’t Network’s only challenge. Whereas some organizations might employ multiple development or security teams, Network operated with a lean team. Any solution they adopted needed to identify true risks in real time and enable the team to understand and address them within minutes.
“We needed a way to detect any significant vulnerabilities in our live images,” Du said. “If an issue arose, we had to ensure we were instantly aware of it and had a means to address it, whether it was a zero-day threat or a general vulnerability.”
Network also recognized that it faced a constantly evolving threat landscape. Its goal was to promptly detect and remediate any critical and high-severity vulnerabilities found during scans within its running workloads. Du and his team needed a lightweight and intuitive solution that would allow them to easily monitor and secure their company’s entire production environment.
Enter Sysdig
Visibly Improving Security
A Demonstrable Reduction in Risk
Since deployment, Du and his team have significantly decreased the number of workloads containing security vulnerabilities that pose a risk to their company, all without needing to expand the team or incur additional expenses.
”In a recent management leadership call, I was able to demonstrate that while we discover new vulnerabilities daily, we’re also remediating them,” Du said. “I would estimate at minimum, a 75% decrease in critical and high vulnerabilities.”
Network uses Sysdig’s vulnerability dashboards, primarily, to monitor the prevalence of critical vulnerabilities over a 30-day period. “If the number of vulnerabilities is going down, we’re on the right track,” said Du. “If it’s increasing, we investigate to identify the problem.”
“We use Sysdig’s dashboards and reports to see precisely what happens in our runtime environment,” Du continued. “When zero-day vulnerabilities emerge, we immediately look to Sysdig to determine the prevalence in our production workloads.”
Prioritizing the Right Problems
Sysdig also helps Du and his team more effectively prioritize issues and distribute work, particularly after deploying the solution to Network’s engineering and DevOps teams.
“Identifying critical vulnerabilities that are active in production is crucial,” Du said. “It’s impractical to prioritize low-level threats that won’t reach production when time is limited. Sysdig has helped us streamline our workload by pinpointing areas where we can achieve the most impactful resolutions.”
Enabling Cost Savings and Exceptional Support
Network considered an outsourced security operations center (SOC) but lacked the budget for it. “Our project history includes exploring a virtual SOC and leveraging our existing tools,” explained Du. “The efficiencies that Sysdig brings played a crucial role in that effort. As a result, we haven’t needed to look for an external SOC.”
“I would estimate our savings with Sysdig at $150,000, equal to one full-time InfoSec Analyst — plus additional savings from consolidating security scanning in our CICD pipelines,” Du continued.
Du has also been consistently impressed at the level of support Network receives from Sysdig. “Our customer success representative is exceptionally valuable; they are like an extension of our security team,” Du said. “As for the product itself, it provides clear insights into our security posture and the threats in our environment.”
Reacting to Threats in Real-Time
Thanks to Sysdig’s contextual awareness, Network has created a highly effective immediate incident response strategy.
“Sysdig’s real-time insights enable us to detect and respond to threats as they are unfolding,” Du said. “Upon detection of a threat, Sysdig promptly provides an explanation and a resolution. This equips us with the necessary information to effectively decide whether immediate action is required or if remediation can be delayed.”
To learn more about Network, visit NetworkPlatform.com and follow them on Linkedin.
About Sysdig
In the cloud, every second counts. Attacks move at warp speed, and security teams must protect the business without slowing it down. Sysdig stops cloud attacks in real time, instantly detecting changes in risk with runtime insights and open source Falco. We correlate signals across cloud workloads, identities, and services to uncover hidden attack paths and prioritize real risk. From prevention to defense, Sysdig helps enterprises focus on what matters: innovation.
Sysdig. Secure Every Second.
Take the Next Step!
See how you can secure every second in the cloud.