Global manufacturer adopts BlackBerry Cylance AI to protect legacy and online systems in Singapore
Sunningdale Tech Ltd, a global manufacturer of precision plastic components, has deployed BlackBerry’s AI-driven autonomous prevention and always-on cybersecurity expertise to protect its manufacturing environment and reduce its cyber risk.
The manufacturing industry and its supply chains are built around a combination of legacy operational systems (OT) and connected IT environments (IT), and the expanding attack surface is making the sector a lucrative and enticing target for threat actors. Sunningdale Tech deployed CylanceGUARD, Blackberry’s Managed Detection and Response (MDR) solution, to ensure continuous 24/7/365 protection in online, offline and air-gapped environments.
For Sunningdale Tech, in-house monitoring and signature-based antivirus software were no longer adequate against today’s threats.
Anthony Pua, Chief Information Officer (Global IT) at Sunningdale Tech Ltd, said: “With cyber-attacks against the manufacturing industry escalating, Sunningdale Tech pivoted to a prevention-first approach to cybersecurity. CylanceGUARD has been a game-changer for our company, enabling us to protect our factory floor with a lightweight agent and skilled external threat hunters that stop threats and eliminate alert noise, allowing Sunningdale Tech’s IT teams to focus on other important priorities.”
Because Cylance AI can operate offline and requires minimal human intervention, it reduced the company’s daily security alerts from 20,000, to fewer than 10.
Pua added: “In addition to minimizing alert fatigue, BlackBerry lets us focus on what we do best, while they are focused on stopping attacks. BlackBerry’s expert analysts act as an extension of my team, correlating telemetry across devices and providing actionable intelligence to prevent threats across our mixed environments. This is future-proofing our organisation, as I believe IT and OT will eventually merge into a single ecosystem as manufacturers embrace Industry 4.0 and tear down the wall between the two.”
In the company’s recent Quarterly Threat Report, BlackBerry reported on the scale and types of IT supply chain cyber-attacks targeting the manufacturing industry, including cybercrime group, BlackCat. It used ransomware to prey upon small and medium-sized businesses along the supply chain, then infiltrate an environment, exfiltrate valuable data, and encrypt connected systems – with manufacturers their ultimate target.
Tash Stamatelos, Vice President, BlackBerry Cybersecurity APAC said: “Manufacturing has become one of the world’s most attacked industries because threat actors know traditional antivirus software and scarce IT teams can’t adequately protect complex, connected supply chains. As a leader in intelligent cybersecurity, we are helping organizations with mixed OT and IT environments, like Sunningdale Tech, use Cylance AI and our trained cyber experts to help stop attacks, and enable a self-defending manufacturing floor.”
A 24×7 managed MDR service, CylanceGUARD provides Sunningdale Tech with access to trained threat prevention experts through a subscription-based model. The solution also includes CylancePROTECT for endpoint protection (EPP) and CylanceOPTICS for endpoint detection and response (EDR), that both use the seventh generation Cylance AI engine from BlackBerry.
These prevention-first solutions provide enhanced visibility and always-on protection against current and future cyber threats in OT environments, from ransomware to device-based attacks, with lightweight clients capable of operating entirely offline.
