Intelligent CISO Issue 01 | Page 51

COVER STORY nd-user

Michael Towers , CISO at Allergan
Pharmaceutical company Allergan is proactively protecting its data with a security solution from Exabeam . The company has implemented Exabeam ’ s User and Entity Behaviour Analytics ( UEBA ) solution to uncover potential threat indicators before they happen , providing a mitigation to data exfiltration and insider theft .

TACKLING THE INSIDER THREAT

THE CHALLENGE THE CHALLENGE
Allergan is a multinational leader in the pharmaceutical industry with operations in more than 100 countries .
Michael Towers , CISO at Allergan , said that there are two unique threats to the industry . “ Number one is intellectual property protection that goes into our medicines , our biologics and our new treatments ,” he said .
“ The second is reputational risk for the company ; making sure that people trust what we ’ re doing for health management and the overall experience of dealing with our company and our brands .”
Allergan operates in an ever-changing environment , which requires ongoing protection from complex threats like malicious insiders and compromised accounts . Towers said that the threat
comes from insiders either “ taking the data themselves or somehow their accounts being compromised and data exfiltrated .” Towers explained how over the last few years , the range of transactions Allergan has undertaken presented an increased risk .
“ We ’ ve done 50 transactions , some of them acquisitions , some of them buying brands or products , some of them domestic ,” he said .
“ They all carry with them a little bit of uncertainty or angst with the employees and the contingent workers that we have . It makes Allergan more susceptible to the insider threat risk generally .”
Allergan looked to Exabeam to fill a specific gap in its analytics programme . Towers said that previously , the company ’ s analytics programme comprised mostly of traditional security information and event www . intelligentciso . com | Issue 01
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