RapidFire Tools Inc., the leading global supplier of business-building technology tools for MSPs, announces major enhancements to its Detector SDS internal threat detection and alerting tool, coinciding with a product rebranding. The new product name, “Cyber Hawk,” comes along with new functionality to help MSPs improve their internal cybersecurity service delivery, while at the same time delivering the documentation they need to help justify their value to their clients.
“The original version of RapidFire Tools’ internal threat detection and alerting solution became our most in-demand offering from the moment of its 2017 launch, under the Detector brand,” commented RapidFire Tools CEO Mike Mittel. “MSPs are hungry for tools that are affordable, easy to use, and help them provide more and better services. This tool has been significantly effective in scanning end-client networks for what we call ‘insider’ cybersecurity threats long-term. We wanted the brand to better communicate this important function to MSPs, hence the new name: Cyber Hawk.”
The tool has been continually updated since its initial release, with two major enhancements just launched in conjunction with the rebranding, to better support MSPs. Enhancements include:
New “Smart Recommendations”
The primary function of the Cyber Hawk appliance is to automatically scan the end-client’s networks on a regular basis, searching for anomalous end-user behaviors, unanticipated changes to the network environment, and other internal threats that occur within the firewall threshold. Previous incarnations of the product identified the threat, its network location, and a general description of actions to address the issue. Cyber Hawk’s latest release delivers an increased level of details on the specific threats, accompanied by a set of easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions on how the MSP can resolve the problems that the Cyber Hawk solution has discovered. This guidance helps speed the MSP’s remediation process, allowing them to more effectively and swiftly address their clients’ needs.
“Our MSP community is looking for not just technology solutions, but also for recommendations on how to remedy the issues that our tools reveal,” said Win Pham, RapidFire Tools’ head of development and the inventor of the Cyber Hawk tool. “There are so many moving parts to any network, and MSPs are required to master an intense array of ever-changing technologies. MSPs, therefore, place great value on the real-time, relevant remediation suggestions now included in Cyber Hawk’s alert system. It’s our goal to make it easier for an MSP to discover and fix network issues, allowing them to become more agile and competitive in this evolving marketplace.”
Weekly and Monthly “Incident Recaps”
In addition to daily internal threat alerts and recommended remediation alerts, Cyber Hawk now automatically generates weekly or monthly summaries of the issues and insider threats that it had identified since the prior summary was conducted. Such essential recaps create a regularly updated set of documents that describe the potential threats in a way that the client can easily consume, allowing those clients to better understand the value of their MSP’s services.
“So much of what the MSP does happens behind the scenes before issues are permitted to have a noticeable impact. One of the challenges of an effective MSP is making end-clients aware of the hard work they perform, in order to avoid being undervalued,” noted Mittel. “The Cyber Hawk recaps help MSPs educate their clients about the scope of threats that have been averted, justifying the fees they charge and deserve.”
The Evolution of Cyber Hawk
Cyber Hawk began as a stand-alone virtual appliance to be installed on the individual end-client’s network, which would perform an automated scan for insider threats and generate email alerts to the MSP for action. The product soon evolved, allowing the MSPs to direct a portion of those alerts directly to the clients, with built-in “action links” directing the MSP to investigate the suspicious alerts, or ignore the alert if the threat was a known and allowable exception to the client’s policies. Cyber Hawk “learns” from the ignored items to reduce false positive results. The MSP can custom-configure each appliance with “Smart Tags” to precisely represent each client’s unique network policies.
Over successive releases, the product evolved into a complete internal threat, cybersecurity service solution. While MSPs can create their own unique service offerings based on the complexity of the security policies to be enforced, RapidFire Tools also included four pre-configured service plans for MSPs to quickly and easily deploy via their self-serve portal. The latest tool allows the MSP to generate branded service catalogs and other marketing materials to help them sell the cybersecurity services they deploy through Cyber Hawk.
“Cyber Hawk is the next step forward in delivering a robust, versatile Cyber Security-as-a-Service offering for MSPs,” remarked Pham. “The solution has been profitable enough that MSPs can offer a baseline level of protection as a free value-add to their standard managed services plan, and then upgrade those clients for higher levels of security over time. It marks a new level of value derived from deep-dive regular network scans.”
