Cybermerc: RedZenit

The AustCyber Projects Fund is a $15 million, three-year initiative designed to help the Australian cyber security industry grow and take ideas globally. Since launching in 2018, AustCyber has provided this funding to projects that are making a real contribution to growing Australia’s cyber security ecosystem, guided by the Sector Competitiveness Plan.

One of the participants in the Project Fund was Cybermerc. Following careers in law enforcement and national security, Cybermerc’s founders witnessed first-hand the rising volume of cybercrime against Australia. Everyone in cyber security seemed to agree that government, industry and academia needed to work together to solve the problem. The founders wanted to take the next step by creating a technical solution. With support from AustCyber’s $15 million Projects Fund. Australian businesses will be able to collaborate and defend each other with Cybermerc’s RedZenit system.

Cybermerc RedZenit is a ‘cyber security team in a box’ that plugs straight into a network, allowing Cybermerc analysts to hunt for cyber security threats, including malicious cyber actors already inside the network. Clients receive a ‘Network Health Assessment’ and ‘Cyber Awareness Training’ to help them understand significant risks to their businesses. Cybermerc’s team of analysts then remotely monitor the network. Internal security staff are taught threat hunting, using their own network data and SIEM solutions and developing in‐house capability.

RedZenit offers a unique, innovative approach to detection. It adapts techniques used to protect critical infrastructure and applies them to defend small to medium‐sized Australian businesses. One such technique is the creation of Deception Operations. These are fake networks within which malware is executed and malicious cyber actors are deceived into exposing their tradecraft and capabilities.

The resulting analysis produces a new method of detection, capable of identifying malicious behaviour. Over multiple RedZenit deployments, this method has detected threats inside networks that market-leading solutions have missed.

The product has now been sold to a range of customers, from small businesses to major enterprises with an international presence. RedZenit doesn’t require the clients to have any in‐house expertise. Most frequently, RedZenit is deployed as a low‐cost solution to evaluate network security and identify priority risks. Beyond that use case, it has been used for insider investigations, threat‐hunting‐ as‐a‐service and defence supply chain assurance.

“RedZenit takes Australia one step closer to becoming the world’s hardest target for cybercrime.”        
Matthew Nevin, CEO of Cybermerc

The key innovation of RedZenit is its ability to connect Australian businesses together in mutual defence. An attack against any RedZenit client updates all others against that attack, allowing Australian businesses to collaborate and protect each other, rather than defending themselves in isolation.

It also drives down the costs of cyber security, with every RedZenit client becoming a link in the armour of the Australian digital economy taking us one step closer to becoming the world’s hardest target for cybercrime.

About Cybermerc

Cybermerc was founded in 2016 by two brothers with backgrounds in law enforcement and federal government work. Cybermerc specialises in Cyber Threat Intelligence products, services and training. The company’s mission is to build a community‐led, collective network defence across Australia and its partners through the AUSHIELD suite of products.

Learn more about Cybermerc on their website.

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Find out more about the other projects involved with the AustCyber Projects Fund.