Marshall Heilman, former longtime CTO of Mandiant and Google Cloud, is transitioning to the insider risk sector as CEO of DTEX. Having identified insider risk as an area ripe for disruption underserved by existing technology, Heilman sees his move to DTEX as the "perfect next opportunity".
Throughout his 17 years at Mandiant, Heilman was an instrumental force in establishing the company's threat intelligence and managed defence businesses as the golden standard in incident response. Now, he intends to apply his expertise to help organizations tackle and protect against insider risks.
Despite organizations allocating only 8.2% of their annual IT budgets to insider risk, 77% have initiated or are planning to create an insider risk programme, and around 50% are increasing their spending in this area, according to research conducted by DTEX and Ponemon. Nevertheless, detecting insider attacks is a considerable challenge, as these incidents often only come to light after data has been exfiltrated.
DTEX claims to offer a unique solution to this issue by capturing and synthesising pseudo-anonymous metadata concerning human behavioural history, trends, and context. This method provides insights into the sequence and nuances of human behaviour, allowing organizations to identify indicators of potentially malicious insider activity and act upon these threats effectively before data exfiltration can occur.
Heilman's appointment comes during a period of expansion for DTEX, driven by increased demand for its proactive InTERCEPT inside risk management platform. In the past year, DTEX has experienced remarkable growth, achieving numerous contracts with Fortune 500 companies across a range of sectors, resulting in a 247% increase in its total contract value.
In his new role, Heilman will utilise his 20+ years of experience in cybersecurity, engineering, and executive leadership to guide DTEX's growth as the company continues to expand into critical infrastructure industries and the federal and defence sectors.
“Insider risk represents the next significant opportunity for disruption. To fully understand any insider incident, visibility into the nuance and sequence of human behavior is pivotal," says Marshall Heilman, DTEX Systems CEO. "I'm excited to help accelerate DTEX's growth in the spirit of protecting the most mission-critical entities against intentional and unintentional data loss.”
Mohan Koo, DTEX Systems Co-founder and President, welcomed Heilman's appointment, highlighting the pressing need for a proactive approach to tackling rising insider incidents in the commercial and federal sectors. Koo says, "Marshall's experience serves as a blueprint for accelerating our growth and, combined with DTEX's proactive approach to insider risk management, is a natural fit that supports our mission to truly uplift security maturity at the international level."