Trend Micro Buys Cloud Security Specialist For £54m

Matthew Broersma,
Networks displayed on a map of the globe

Cloud Conformity acquisition aimed at helping customers guard against misconfigured public cloud accounts, beginning with Amazon Web Services

Trend Micro is to acquire cloud security specialist Cloud Conformity for $70 million (£54m) as it seeks to bolster its expertise in protecting public cloud infrastructure.

The Tokyo-based platform security firm said the acquisition would help it protect users against misconfigured public cloud accounts.

The buy comes a year after Palo Alto Networks acquired RedLock, one of Cloud Conformity’s chief competitors, for $173m.

Trend chief executive Eva Chen said that the growth of the cloud is leaving many large organisations facing a “wild west” approach to cloud implementation that leaves them with unmanaged risk.

Cloud SecurityRisk management

“As an AWS technology Partner of the Year for 2019, Cloud Conformity understands these implementations and the risks,” she said.  “Their offering perfectly complements our own portfolio and provides immediate value to customers.”

Cloud Conformity is to become part of Trend’s hybrid cloud security practice, which accounts for one-quarter of the firm’s nearly $1bn in annual sales.

The 50-person start-up was founded in Sydney, Australia, in 2016 and is now based in the US, providing protection of AWS workloads for 125 customers.

A test version of the offering for Azure has been available for the past month, with a version for Google’s cloud on the way in a matter of weeks, the company said.

Data breach

All Cloud Conformity staff, the majority of whom work in research and development, are to join Trend, with the company’s sales personnel to be integrated into Trend’s broader workforce.

The buy is Trend’s first since it purchased web application vendor Immunio in November 2017.

Cloud misconfiguration is a growing problem, with sensitive public cloud repositories at times left open to the internet due to oversights.

In September of this year, for instance, a misconfigured AWS S3 bucket led to a data breach that exposed the personal details of millions of Ecuadorian citizens, and even WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange, who received asylum in London’s Ecuadorian embassy for seven years.