Industry leader in advanced threat protection provides IT with visibility into social media risks and attacks

SUNNYVALE, Calif., – August 5, 2015 – Proofpoint, Inc., (NASDAQ: PFPT), a leading next-generation security and compliance company, today announced from Black Hat USA 2015 (booth #1111) Proofpoint Targeted Attack Protection (TAP) Social Discover, which provides IT administrators with immediate visibility into the social media accounts linked to their organizations and the ability to persistently monitor for spam, phishing, malware, bad actors and fraud. Armed with this knowledge and Proofpoint Targeted Attack Protection threat intelligence across both social and email vectors, security teams can create a more comprehensive strategy to combat advanced attacks.

“IT cannot protect their organizations from attack surfaces they are not actively monitoring—and cannot see,” said Devin Redmond, vice president and general manager of Nexgate for Proofpoint. “Over the last 10 years, billions of dollars have been invested in social business and with that rise has come an increase in social media-based threats, like malware and phishing attacks. However, IT has very little visibility into social media risks as most activity happens outside the corporate network and has been the domain of social media teams. Proofpoint TAP Social Discover closes this knowledge gap, enabling IT to easily see malicious social media activity and integrate this information with existing threat intelligence to stop data exfiltration and targeted attacks.”

According to a recent Proofpoint study, Fortune 100 brands are experiencing at least one compromise per business day on their social media channels. The social media security risk to organizations was also recently echoed by Greg Young, research vice president for Gartner, Inc., in his Gartner Security & Risk Management Summit 2015 talk entitled The Next Three Years in Threats. During the discussion he stated, “Existing vulnerabilities dominate malware lists and it’s important to close old known holes. However, manually distributed malware via social media and in response to phishing will be the greatest growth category.” ^[1]

Proofpoint TAP Social Discover Closes the Social Media Risk Visibility Gap

Proofpoint TAP Social Discover provides valuable context into an organization’s social media risk footprint across all leading social networks, including Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest. Without the need to deploy software or hardware, Proofpoint TAP Social Discover does not require security teams to work with digital marketing teams or individual employee advocates to get access to social accounts, nor does it interfere with any social marketing activities. With Proofpoint’s added visibility and context, IT/security teams can engage with their own digital and social media teams to better protect and scale their social media programs.

Completely cloud-based, Proofpoint TAP Social Discover uses more than nine unique security classification engines, including machine learning, behavioral analysis, sandboxing, heuristics, social app signatures and more. IT administrators can easily see social media security risks and issues with Proofpoint TAP Social Discover’s dashboard, built-in reports and alerts. Visibility is also heightened with seamless SIEM and broader security operation center dashboard integration.

Once nefarious activities are identified by Proofpoint TAP Social Discover, administrators can take immediate action with the broader Proofpoint TAP for Social product line to combat the growing wave of social risks. Proofpoint TAP Social Discover enables security teams to connect the social media risks they discover with cybercriminals who may also be targeting the organization through other attack vectors, such as email.

Gaining visibility across all threat vectors dramatically enhances the ability of security professionals to develop enforceable threat mitigation policies. This protects organizations while enabling employees, customers and partners to interact more safely on social channels. For more information about Proofpoint TAP Social Discover, please visit http://nexgate.com/tap-for-social/.  

About Proofpoint, Inc.

Proofpoint Inc. (NASDAQ:PFPT) is a leading next-generation security and compliance company that provides cloud-based solutions for comprehensive threat protection, incident response, secure communications, social media security, compliance, archiving and governance. Organizations around the world depend on Proofpoint’s expertise, patented technologies and on-demand delivery system. Proofpoint protects against phishing, malware and spam, while safeguarding privacy, encrypting sensitive information, and archiving and governing messages and critical enterprise information. More information is available at www.proofpoint.com. 

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Proofpoint is a registered trademark of Proofpoint, Inc. in the U.S. and/or other countries. All other trademarks contained herein are the property of their respective owners.

[1] Gartner, Smarter With Gartner, The Next Three Years in Security Threats, Greg Young, http://www.gartner.com/smarterwithgartner/the-next-three-years-in-security-threats/

Media Contact: 

Patricia Hogan

Proofpoint, Inc.

408-763-3863

phogan@proofpoint.com