Trustwave is expanding its ability to offer managed security services across Canada through a partnership with Rogers Communications to increase its reach to small and medium-sized businesses.
Starting early next year the communications giant will resell Trustwave services through its large direct salesforce and network of enterprise resellers. Trustwave, owned by Singapore-based Singtel, opened a security operations centre in the Kitchener, Ont., area in August  This offering will be run from Rogers’ data centres said Stewart Cawthray, Rogers senior director of product management for enterprise security.
Services will include real-time monitoring of a SIEM (security information and event management) intrusion detection, firewalls, unified threat appliances, threat analytics support plus professional services for security assessment, compliance, vulnerability scanning and penetration testing. “We can look at the business challenges customers are having and adapt the Rogers capabilities and Trustwave capabilities to find that cyber security solution for them,” Cawthray said.
“The price will vary by the size of what’s being monitored. In a managed SIEM, for example, it will vary by the number of log sources and the number of sites those log sources are located at. There will be a recurring monthly fee that will include all of the hardware and software licencing as well as the support services required to monitor, analyze and report on any threats that are seen.”
Because services will depend on the number of sources they can scale from small firms to enterprises, he added. “In particular I think Canadian SMBs haven’t had very a solid security as a service-type model available to them. The existing players in Canada tend to focus their efforts on the larger corporations, and I think medium organizations in particular, and starting to be smaller organizations, are struggling finding [people with] security skills, and they are realizing they are now under attack just as much as the large organizations and they need help.”
He believes SIEM monitoring will be the most popular service. “Many organizations have no visibility into what threats they’re currently under, and once you get soem visibility into that you can start to make better plans on how you approach cyber threats and how to grow your business in a secure way.”
The official launch will be at the end of February, but Rogers [TSX: RCI.B] is already reaching out to potential customers and some will be able to receive service in January.
There’s a long list of companies offering managed security services here, ranging from small ISPs to Bell, Telus and IBM. Asked if Rogers is late to the game, Cawthray admitted it is, at least for the enterprise market. “I think in the medium-SMB space we’re right at the beginning of it. These customers are just starting to look at alternatives and they’re struggling finding something that fits into their business model with the current managed security providers out there.”
Smaller providers can’t offer the breadth of global threat intelligence resources that Trustwave has, he added. At the same time because it has a Canadian operations centre Trustwave can appeal to organizations sensitive to data sovereignty issues, he said.
