Proofpoint Acquires ObserveIT to Bolster DLP Capabilities

Proofpoint today confirmed plans to acquire ObserveIT in a $225 million cash transaction. It plans to use the insider threat management platform to build out its data loss prevention (DLP) capabilities to respond to threats in cloud applications, email, and lightweight endpoint agents.

ObserveIT offers endpoint agent technology and data risk analytics. Proofpoint plans to expand its technology into a new DLP platform designed to join email, cloud access security brokers (CASB), and data at rest into one tool. Its idea is to improve teams' real-time detections of suspicious activity across more data, people, devices, and applications as employees use more devices and services to do their jobs.

"More and more users are accessing corporate data from endpoint off the corporate network in both sanctioned and unsanctioned cloud apps," wrote Ryan Kalember, Proofpoint's executive vice president of cybersecurity strategy, in a blog post on the acquisition. As they do, companies demand new controls to understand where and how users interact with their data.

This new integrated tool will be part of the Proofpoint information protection suite and is predicted to be available in 2020. The acquisition is expected to close late in the fourth quarter of 2019, pending customary closing conditions and regulatory approvals.

As part of the deal, Proofpoint will also invest in ObserveIT's insider threat management platform, which will continue to be available. Current users will have access to Proofpoint's broader threat intelligence and R&D resources as ObserveIT continues to work on the platform.

Read more details here.

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