Dragos, a Global Industrial Control System Cybersecurity Startup, Raises $10 Million in Series A Venture Capital - Seite 2

The company's biggest technological differentiator is its behavioral analytics. Instead of "anomaly detection" and other types of machine learning-driven technologies that are hitting the market, the approach of Dragos is to codify human experience facing human adversaries. It identifies adversary tradecraft and turns it into behavioral analytics. As a result, defenders get context of what is going on and recommendations on what to do next, not merely a series of alerts.

"Dragos exists to safeguard civilization," said Robert M. Lee, the CEO of Dragos.  "Critical infrastructure powers the global economy and the fabric of modern society. We all strongly believe that civilian infrastructure should be off limits to any adversaries, no matter where the infrastructure is located in the world."

Dragos was founded by ICS cybersecurity experts Lee, Jon Lavender and Justin Cavinee, all veterans of the U.S. intelligence community. There they established a first-of-its-kind mission for the U.S. government to identify, analyze and respond to nation-states launching ICS-focused cyberattacks.

"Industrial control systems are unique unto themselves - hybrid digital and analog environments with very different operational temperaments," said Bob Ackerman, the founder and a Managing Director of cybersecurity investment specialist Allegis Capital. "Unless you have lived your life in this environment, you can't truly appreciate how different or complex ICS systems are.  With Dragos, we invested in the "A" team."

"Protecting the integrity of the grid has always been a top priority for utility operators," said Sameer Reddy, a Vice President at EIP and co-leader of the Series A financing. "One of the critical challenges is access to sufficient human capital. The Dragos platform, which is built and managed by true ICS cybersecurity experts, provides significant force multiplication to ICS operators around the world."

"Energy is essential to our economy and way of life. As a result, energy infrastructure is increasingly a target," said Thomas A. Fanning, Chairman, President and CEO of Southern Company. "As a founding investor in Energy Impact Partners, Southern Company is proud to support enhancing the resiliency of critical infrastructure, in order to better protect the communities where we live and serve."