Best Practices
The managed security services market is growing at a healthy clip due to a confluence of several factors, most notably staffing and skill pressures, an ever-evolving threat landscape, and an increasing compliance burden. As a result, not only are we seeing a significant change in the services offered, but the demands from the customers are also changing and shaping some of those changes. It's safe to assume that using a managed security services provider (MSSP) today is a lot more than just a cheap alternative to doing the same work in-house. MSSPs are not just managing devices; they also provide insightful analysis that can help with business decisions.
Total Economic Impact
Although business is paying attention to — and money for — IT security, many CISOs still lack influence with executives. Vendors have an opportunity to serve as both trusted advisor and solution provider if they can give customers the tools and insight to gain greater credibility with the business.
Balanced Scorecard
Security initiatives will focus on four things: protecting data, streamlining costly or manually intensive tasks, providing security for an evolving IT infrastructure, and both understanding and properly managing IT risks within a more comprehensive enterprise framework. The focus on efficiently delivering security to support business and IT initiatives will drive organizations to shift their purchasing behaviors. While the largest standalone security vendors remain strong within the threat-management market categories and small vendors continue to proliferate, we will see a new breed of security gorillas delivering business and IT services and solutions for which security is imbedded.