Narus is one of the world’s leading companies, pioneers technologies for the protection and management of large IP networks, besides having significant focus on cyber security, has continued its momentum in India this year. ‘InfoSecurity’ recently spoke to Mr. Yogi Mistry, Senior Vice President, Narus, to understand their strength and strategy for Indian market.

Mr. Yogi Mistry, Senior Vice President, Narus

1) What is the current state of cyber security in India?

Enhancing cyber security is very important to protect businesses, governments and general public. Cyber crime has evolved significantly and is no longer just a threat to industry and individuals, but increasingly to national security. It was reported that about 10 Indian government ministry websites were targets of cyber attacks in the last one year, the problem is real time. With the increase in cyber attacks over the last few years, Government of India has stepped up its efforts and has been taking actions to improve the security system.

All of us are still exposed to security breaches and identity thefts of different types. India’s telecom markets are growing quickly, and the government has recognized a need to put in place its own lawful intercept regulation. As a result, carriers in India are simultaneously looking to meet government mandates and secure their networks by implementing a system that provides a total network view to meet both intercept and security needs. At the same time, government organizations in India need cyber security solutions to protect its own network infrastructure as well as solutions to protect the people of India.

2) How Narus is uniquely positioned to extend their expertise in this space?

Narus is the global leader in real-time traffic intelligence for the protection and management of large IP networks. We are the only software company that provides security, intercept and traffic management solutions within a single, flexible system. With us, service providers, governments and large enterprises around the world can immediately detect, analyze, mitigate and target any unwanted, unwarranted or malicious traffic. Narus solutions provide its customers with complete, real-time insight into all of their IP traffic from the network to the applications, enabling customers to take the most appropriate actions quickly. With a combination of specific solution configurations built around Cyber Protection, Intercept, and Traffic Management, Narus is able to meet the broad set of needs to address the threats to national infrastructures.

3) How strong is Narus's R&D team to combat with ever increasing intelligent cyber criminals?

In cooperation with the Narus Advanced Technology Team, the Narus Research Fellows are jointly researching, benchmarking and enhancing architecture, performance and current capabilities of the umbrella NarusInsight product and the accompanying NarusInsight Cyber Protection Solution, NarusInsight Intercept Solution and NarusInsight Traffic Management Solution. This enables Narus to deliver the most innovative and complete solutions to satisfy customers' current and future needs for real-time traffic intelligence solutions.

The combination of next-generation algorithms and Narus's highly distributed scalable architectures and systems provide all forms of data carriers (wire and wireless) the total network to analyze the traffic and to take action against even the most complex attacks. This ensures the profitable delivery of new revenue-generating IP services. Our R&D efforts are supported by immense expertise securing some the biggest networks across the world. Today, Narus’ system protects and manages the largest IP networks in the United States and around the world, some of which include KT (Korea), KDDI (Japan), Raytheon, Telecom Egypt, Reliance (India), Sify (India), Cable and Wireless, Saudi Telecom, U.S. Cellular and many more.

4) Cyber criminals are today equipped with advanced tools and sophisticated methods. Do you have any unique solution, which can detect and protect sensitive information from ever evolving cunning hackers?

Our flagship solution, NarusInsight, is the industry leading traffic intelligence system for capturing, analyzing and correlating IP traffic in real time. NarusInsight is the foundation for the industry's most advanced real-time cyber protection, intercept and traffic management solutions.

Regardless of the consuming application and whether the information required is based on full packets, application-layer metrics or basic flow-level information, NarusInsight captures and processes the information in real time in a single network-wide system. With NarusInsight’s capabilities to "see" traffic from the network through the application layer, Narus is in a unique position to help its customers understand their traffic. Once they understand the traffic, the NarusInsight Solutions for Cyber Protection, Intercept and Traffic Management allow them to protect and manage their networks, and to comply with governmental regulations.

The latest version of NarusInsight, which was announced in September 2009, introduces highly customizable and extensible monitoring capabilities, powerful analytics and increased system performance. With the new extended functionality, service providers and government organizations now have an even more robust solution available to protect and manage their large IP networks in real time.

5) How do you see the state of cyber security in India, when compared to others countries in APAC in next few years?

Governments have increasingly expressed their concern about public safety and national security and have reiterated the fact that we are not doing enough to address this problem. The Indian government is among the leaders in APAC to proactively address this issue. The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs has recently approved the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network & Systems (CCTNS) Project within the outlay of Rs. 2,000 crore in the 11th Five Year Plan. They need solutions to manage and protect today’s large, complex IP networks, where organizations can understand in detail what kind of traffic is traveling their network. They need traffic intelligence: insight into traffic patterns, paths and types, and payload information.

6) Do you have any specific strategy for Indian market, as security awareness is not as much as it should be?

Current growth in the Indian telecommunications industry mirrors the late nineties’ expansion in the United States. New service providers are emerging while global service providers are applying for licenses to provide services in India. At the same time, government organizations are increasingly faced with cyber attacks on their network infrastructure and the need to fight terrorism by coordinating efforts with the Indian service providers. Both the service providers and government organizations need to implement a system that provides a total network view to meet the intercept and cyber security needs.

Narus’ India operation has seen a 50 percent increase in staff, and the company plans another 30 percent increase in headcount in the coming year to keep up with its growing backlog of business in this region and to better support our customers.

Along with strong partners in India that understand the dynamic culture and share the local contacts, Narus has been able to successfully penetrate the market and garner several important customers. In May, Narus formed a strategic partnership with HCL Infosystems, Ltd., India’s premier information-enabling ICT system integration company, to assist the Indian government in the protection of its people and infrastructure. Narus also implemented systems at India’s foremost integrated telecom service providers like Reliance, Sify, and Cable & Wireless, among others.

7) How efficient is your 'Traffic Intelligence Solution' as compared to others solutions available in this space?

NarusInsight is the most scalable, real-time traffic intelligence system for the protection and management of large IP networks. The ability to offer wide visibility across heterogeneous networks and provide deep insight into multiple layers of network traffic in real time is what separates Narus from all providers in the developing traffic intelligence market.

Our Real-Time Traffic Intelligence system offers strength to solve complex, dynamic problems, which are not seen or solved by existing siloed solutions. Its system approach provides holistic traffic visibility not possible with an appliance or stovepipe solution. This intelligent system also offers innovative algorithms and analysis tools create new knowledge to make better decisions (strategic and operational)

8) Would you like to spread your wings in others security areas apart from cyber security in near future?

Cyber security is one of the major areas that Narus addresses. In addition, Narus customers utilize the NarusInsight traffic intelligence system for legal intercept to meet government mandates and for traffic management to protect to successfully maintain control over their network assets. In today’s environment of illegal and unwanted services being introduced into private or closely managed public networks, the ability to maintain management control is vital for success and security.

—By: Mr. Yogi Mistry, Senior Vice President, Narus