Microsoft has confirmed it is buying RiskIQ, a threat intelligence and attack surface management company in its fifth acquisition of 2021.
RiskIQ is perhaps best known in the UK for identifying how BA's data breach was caused attacked after a card skimming attack in 2018.
RiskIQ specialises in IT security outside the firewall, including by generating an internet-facing asset map across large and complex entities, then tracking how that has evolved; this can, for example, help identify and remediate malicious JavaScript injection like the kind BA fell victim to.
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"RiskIQ has built a strong customer base and community of security professionals who we will continue to support, nurture, and grow. RiskIQ’s technology and team will be a powerful addition to our security portfolio to best serve our mutual customers" said Microsoft VP Eric Doerr.
Redmond did not put a price on the deal -- widely reported to have been in the $500 million region -- and described it in a July 12 post as set to "help our shared customers build a more comprehensive view of the global threats to their businesses, better understand vulnerable internet-facing assets, and build world-class threat intelligence."
RiskIQ, founded in 2009, says it has 80,000 security analysts and over 300 enterprises around the world using its products. The deal comes a month after Microsoft confirmed plans to buy IoT security startup ReFirm labs.
Deals in the security space continue to flow thick and fast and come as tech company valuations have ballooned to over $35 trillion: a figure that places their combined value as higher than the whole of the US’s $20.81 trillion GDP in 2020, according to new research from Dealroom. S&P Global Market Intelligence said this month that investors spent $40 billion on technology vendors in the first six months of 2021, with valuations soaring.
