2019 Internet Of Things 50: 10 Coolest IoT Security Vendors

IoT 50: Security

When the internet came to a halt for millions of people in fall 2016, the world would soon learn that a massive horde of unsecured Internet of Things devices were the culprit. A malware program called Mirai had been used to take over these devices and launch a large distributed denial-of-service attack against critical internet infrastructure. For the tech industry, this was a wake-up call for the importance of securing IoT devices against a growing number of attacks. With Gartner forecasting IoT security spending to grow to $3.1 billion in 2021, new offerings for protecting and securing devices are popping up on a regular basis, ranging in capabilities from threat monitoring to access control.

What follows are 10 companies with the coolest IoT security offerings right now.

Armis

Top Executive: Yevgeny Dibrov, CEO

Backed by $47 million in venture capital, Palo Alto, Calif.-based Armis is expanding research and development and sales and marketing for its agentless security platform, which gives enterprises visibility and control of the increasing number of unmanaged devices coming into workspaces.

Claroty

Top Executive: Amir Zilberstein, CEO

With a focus on threat detection and monitoring for industrial control networks, Claroty is gaining the backing of industrial giants like Schneider Electric and Siemens while the New York-based company continues to add new capabilities, such as OT network segmentation and expanded integrations.

Cradlepoint

Top Executive: George Mulhern, CEO, Chairman

Cradlepoint is taking a security-focused approach to how customers connect and manage IoT devices on networks, ranging from the Boise, Idaho-based company’s NetCloud Manager ability to perform group firmware updates for devices to NetCloud Perimeter’s ability to create secure private IoT networks.

ForeScout

Top Executive: Michael DeCesare, CEO, President

With a focus on device visibility and segmentation on business networks, ForeScout is expanding its capabilities, most recently with the San Jose, Calif.-based company’s acquisition of SecurityMatters, a startup that provides visibility into industrial devices in operational technology environments.

Fortinet

Top Executive: Ken Xie, Chairman, CEO

After acquiring access control vendor Bradford Networks last year, Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Fortinet is expanding its IoT security capabilities, most notably with its new network access control solution, FortiNAC, which identifies all endpoints on the network and segments them based on behavior.

SonicWall

Top Executive: Bill Conner, President, CEO

Milpitas, Calif.-based SonicWall is stomping out IoT security threats throughout its portfolio, ranging from its firewall and access point products that can detect malicious code traversing the network to the SonicWall Capture Client that can prevent exploits from being executed.

Trend Micro

Top Executive: Eva Chen, CEO

Trend Micro provides IoT security offerings for a wide range of industries, from automotive and manufacturing to banking and surveillance. The Japanese company’s IoT security software protects connected devices against potential attacks by performing ongoing risk detection and assessment.

VDOO

Top Executives: Netanel Davidi, Uri Alter, Co-CEOs

After raising $13 million from Dell and other investors last year, Tel Aviv, Israel-based VDOO is expanding its IoT security analysis platform, which can now provide an embedded security agent for connected devices based on analysis of each device’s specifications and vulnerabilities.

Xage Security

Top Executive: Duncan Greatwood, CEO

Backed with more than $12 million from GE Ventures and other investors, Palo Alto, Calif.-based Xage Security is using blockchain technology to protect industrial IoT networks and infrastructure with its platform, which provides a decentralized security layer for machine-to-machine communication.

Zingbox

Top Executive: Xu Zou, CEO

Backed by Dell Technologies Capital, Zingbox’s IoT Guardian platform automatically detects IoT devices on the network and uses deep learning to detect anomalies in communication signals. The Mountain View, Calif.-based company has alliance partnerships with VMware, Cisco and Fortinet.