It’s official. Earlier this week, IBM announced that it had acquired Polar Security, a technology innovator from Israel that helps companies better manage their cloud systems. This acquisition aims at automating cloud data management.
According to Israeli news media, the acquisition was made to the tune of $60 million.
This acquisition is the fifth from IBM in 2023. Since Arvind Krishna stepped up as IBM’s chief executive officer in April 2020, the company has already acquired over 30 companies, accelerating its hybrid cloud and artificial intelligence capabilities.
Notably, in February, IBM purchased GraphQL specialist StepZen and also announced its plans to take advantage of the capabilities of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) vendor NS1. In September 2022, IBM announced takeover bids for Dialexa, a digital product engineering company. This was followed by takeover bids for Octo, an IT modernization vendor, last December.
Founded in January 2021, very young, Polar Security is the first Data Security Posture Management Platform (DSPM) to automate cloud data security and compliance wherever their clients’ sensitive data are, however fast developers create them.
Unclear details
Polar Security was co-founded by cybersecurity veteran Dov Yoran, its chairman; Guy Shanny, its CEO; and Roey Yaacovi, its chief technology officer.
However, it is still unclear who among them or how many of their staff will be coming over with the acquisition. It is also still vague about who its current clients are.
Furthermore, it is also not clear if IBM is making this acquisition only for internal purposes or to beef up its security portfolio. You may know that IBM has large-scale holdings in the field of security – encompassing software, managed security, and consulting. It has made a considerable number of acquisitions in that space to build its portfolio.
How the acquisition will work
According to IBM, it is looking at integrating Polar Security’s DSPM technology within its Guardium unit, a family of data security products. With this integration, IBM’s Guardium unit will provide security teams with a data security platform that covers all data types across all storage locations – may they be SaaS, on-premise, or in-public cloud infrastructure.
Of course, IBM will be tapping into Polar Security’s capabilities. IBM stated, “Polar Security can automatically find unknown and sensitive data across the cloud, including structured and unstructured assets within cloud service providers, SaaS properties, and data lakes. Once discovered, Polar Security classifies the data, maps the potential and actual flow of that data, and identifies vulnerabilities, such as misconfigurations, over-entitlements, and behavior that violates policy or regulations.”
Polar Security will then provide automatically generated reports prioritizing threats according to risk levels and practical guidance on correcting any mishaps.
