Special Edition
Computer security testing comment and analysis from SE LABS Ⓡ

Solid endpoint protection is a bare minimum

If it feels like new breaches are reported every week, it’s because they are. Attackers are taking no prisoners and are successfully breaking into businesses, political organisations and systems belonging to individuals. Most believe they have solid endpoint protection in place.

It’s not like a bank robbery, where the bad guys have to spend lots of time and effort to put themselves at physical risk for the sake of one big score. Ransomware extortions can happen in parallel. Criminals sit in front of screens watching piles of victims become compromised.

ENDPOINT PROTECTION: NEW REPORTS ONLINE!

Posted on December 28th, 2020 by SE Labs Team and tagged 2020, anti-virus, cyber security, endpoint, enterprise, hacking, home user, review, security testing, security vendor, small business, standards, targeted attacks, test results

A set of backups may no longer be enough

A journalist asked us if we felt that ransomware attackers had evolved. But the truth of the matter is, there’s no need for them to do so judging by the large number of publicised cases in which they are able to achieve success without being too creative.

Posted on December 10th, 2020 by SE Labs Team and tagged 2020, anti-virus, cyber security, enterprise, hacking, home user, online security, predictions, ransomware, security vendor, small business, targeted attacks

And how can you tell?

If you are in charge of protecting an organisation, you need good data to help make buying decisions. The consequences of simply trusting internet reviews, vendor sales pitches and instinct are extremely serious. So which security product tests are the best?

This article first appeared on LinkedIn (17th November, 2020)

Posted on November 25th, 2020 by Simon PG Edwards and tagged 2020, anti-virus, cyber security, enterprise, hacking, home user, review, security testing, security vendor, small business, targeted attacks

And we’re really quite proud about it!

Our tests are so close to real-life hacking that sometimes there is no practical difference between the two. We don’t usually expect to interact directly with cyber criminals, but it sometimes happens. In this case, our attacker was rude enough to spoil our initial analysis and to leave a sexually aggressive message for our team, too. SE Labs has been hacked!

For immediate context, if you’ve never heard of SE Labs before, we are a computer security testing organisation. We expose our test systems to all manner of horrible software and people, to judge how effectively different security products work. No customer data was lost in this story!

Posted on November 9th, 2020 by Simon PG Edwards and tagged 2020, anti-virus, breach, cyber security, endpoint, enterprise, hacking, home user, review, security testing, security vendor, small business, targeted attacks

How fast is your firewall? And does it still protect your business when it’s busy?

SE Labs has launched its network security performance testing service. Our reports will answer questions like, “How fast is this NGFW, really?” And, “How well does it protect, even when it’s very busy?”

We have worked with the major global vendors in this area for over a year, identifying and addressing gaps in existing network performance testing. We’ve focussed on ensuring that these new tests from SE Labs are fair, honest, reliable and accurate.

These tests are the first of a new breed.

Posted on November 2nd, 2020 by SE Labs Team and tagged 2020, anti-virus, cyber security, endpoint, enterprise, hacking, network, network performance, performance, review, security testing, security vendor, standards, targeted attacks

How we run our Breach Response testing, and why

In this blog post our CTO Stefan Dumitrascu explains some of the challenges behind our newly launched Breach Response testing, why things are now different (better) and the background on how we came to make some of our decisions.

One of our most exciting projects this year has been the Breach Response testing programme. In this article we explain what has changed since last year, and why.

Posted on October 26th, 2020 by Stefan Dumitrascu and tagged 2020, anti-virus, breach response, BRTS, cyber security, endpoint, enterprise, hacking, review, security testing, security vendor, standards, targeted attacks, threat series

Get ahead in the game that never ends

Have you ever been hacked? You, personally, or your business? If your answer is, “no” it would be interesting to know how you can be so sure.

I once spoke to a marketing manager at a global anti-malware company who claimed that his PC had never been infected by malware, despite him not using anti-virus. How would be know?

Not all malware announces its presence as clearly as, say ransomware. “I just would,” he claimed.

ENDPOINT PROTECTION: NEW REPORTS ONLINE!

Posted on October 19th, 2020 by SE Labs Team and tagged 2020, anti-virus, cyber security, endpoint, enterprise, hacking, home user, review, security testing, security vendor, small business, standards, targeted attacks, test results

Well, 2020 was an interesting year! Some of the largest and newest security companies were bought and sold…

The world descended into chaos thanks to a biological virus (while digital viruses continue to wreak havoc)…

And SE Labs launched a new website and started using machine learning in its testing.

We appreciate some of these things are more important than others…

However, in the face of adversity we must all carry on and we are proud to announce our second annual report, in which we review the unprecedented year of 2020, announce our annual awards winners and discuss testing like hackers.

Posted on October 8th, 2020 by SE Labs Team and tagged 2020, annual report, anti-virus, cyber security, endpoint, enterprise, hacking, home user, review, security testing, security vendor, small business, standards, targeted attacks, test results

Bad guys help SE Labs keep its testing up to date

Latest endpoint protection reports now online for enterprise, small business and home users.

For the first time in our endpoint protection tests we’ve seen a strong overall performance from both well-established anti-malware brands and newer entrants to the market.

Vendors such as FireEye and Crowdstrike are well-known and respected brands in the security world, but they are relatively new compared to Symantec, McAfee and even Microsoft. Microsoft has not promoted its anti-malware software until quite recently.

Posted on August 10th, 2020 by SE Labs Team and tagged 2020, anti-virus, cyber security, endpoint, enterprise, hacking, home user, review, security testing, security vendor, small business, standards, targeted attacks, test results

The new security testing site reflects the changes in the security industry over the last few years. We’ve listened hard to your feedback and watched as the industry’s needs have changed.

Clients, both security vendors and their customers, need increasingly customised analysis of products and their effectiveness. Which is the best? And what does ‘best’ really mean?

Posted on July 1st, 2020 by SE Labs Team and tagged 2020, cyber security, enterprise, hacking, home user, investors, media, review, security testing, security vendor, small business, standards, start-up, startup, targeted attacks, testing, website