Microsoft Defender Updates

At Ignite 2020, Microsoft is showcasing the unification of its security solutions for both Microsoft 365 and Azure under the umbrella of Microsoft Defender. Microsoft Threat Protection has been renamed Microsoft 365 Defender, while Microsoft Defender Advanced Threat Protection has been renamed Microsoft Defender for Endpoint. Key updates include extending protection of the solution to mobile threats, such as phishing threats in Android and iOS. Additionally, Office 365 Advanced Threat Protection has been renamed Microsoft Defender for Office 365 and is now in public preview--with features such as protection for highly targeted, priority email accounts.

Meanwhile, Azure Security Center’s cloud workload protection capabilities will now be known as Azure Defender. Updates include protection for virtual machines and SQL databases across both on-premises and multi-cloud deployments, as well as simplification for on-boarding and management of the database and VM resources. Microsoft said it is also enhancing protection for containers by extending the Azure Defender for Kubernetes solution “to include Kubernetes-level policy management, hardening and enforcement with admission control.” For improving security in the Internet of Things, Azure Defender for IoT--the new name for Azure Security Center for IoT--is adding agentless security for IoT devices on operational technology networks (via Microsoft’s acquisition of CyberX). Lastly, Microsoft Defender will now be integrated with Microsoft’s SIEM offering, Azure Sentinel, “for visibility and actionable insights enterprise-wide,” the company said.