Check Point Acquiring Cyber Startup Atmosec To Up Its SaaS Security Offering

Check Point's acquisition of Atmosec is likely to close by mid-September 2023.

IT security major Check Point has announced it is acquiring a start-up named Atmosec that specialises in the discovery and disconnection of malicious SaaS applications, preventing risky third-party SaaS communications and rectifying SaaS misconfiguration. The widespread adoption of SaaS apps has exposed organisations to an increased array of cyber threats. According to a report by Statista, 130 SaaS applications are used by organizations on average, globally. However, Atmosec’s research says that there are approximately 700 additional SaaS applications in use without IT’s knowledge.

Check Point's acquisition of Atmosec is likely to close by mid-September 2023.

Moreover, within popular enterprise SaaS platforms like O365 and Slack, hundreds of third-party apps are connected. This ever-expanding SaaS landscape not only increases the potential attack surface, but it also introduces many apps that could be harmful or misused to leak sensitive information, often bypassing proper IT authorization.

“The shift to SaaS applications introduces specific challenges, notably in the realm of malicious SaaS-to-SaaS communications. Atmosec´s capabilities in SaaS discovery, risk assessment, and full visibility are instrumental in addressing these challenges,” Nataly Kremer, Chief Product Officer and Head of R&D at Check Point Software Technologies, said in a statement.

“Integrating Atmosec’s technology into Check Point Infinity sets us to deliver one of the industry’s most secure SASE solutions, enabling organizations to effectively manage SaaS security, prevent data leaks, unauthorized access, and malware dissemination, and ensure a robust, adaptive zero trust environment.”

Atmosec's key features include quick discovery and disconnection of malicious SaaS applications, completed in under 10 minutes, prevention of third-party SaaS apps from communicating with an enterprise's SaaS environment, providing full visibility into authorised and unauthorised SaaS applications, fixing misconfigurations within SaaS applications such as publicly exposed repositories, and more.