IBM Launches New QRadar Security Suite to Speed Threat Detection and Response

ARMONK, N.Y.April 24, 2023 — Today IBM unveiled its new security suite designed to unify and accelerate the security analyst experience across the full incident lifecycle. The IBM Security QRadar Suite represents a major evolution and expansion of the QRadar brand, spanning all core threat detection, investigation and response technologies, with significant investment in innovations across the portfolio.

 

The new IBM Security QRadar Suite includes EDR/XDR, SIEM, SOAR, ¬and a new cloud-native log management capability – all built around a common user interface, shared insights and connected workflows

Delivered as a service, the IBM Security QRadar Suite is built on an open foundation and designed specifically for the demands of hybrid cloud. It features a single, modernized user interface across all products – embedded with advanced AI and automation designed to empower analysts to work with greater speed, efficiency and precision across their core toolsets.

Today’s Security Operation Center (SOC) teams are protecting a fast-expanding digital footprint that extends across hybrid cloud environments – creating complexity and making it hard to keep pace with accelerating attack speeds. They can be slowed down by labor-intensive alert investigations and response processes, manually stitching together insights and pivoting between disconnected data, tools and interfaces. SOC professionals say they spend around one-third of their day investigating and validating incidents that turn out to not be real threats, according to a recent survey.2

Built on the company’s existing leadership in 12 security technology categories,3 IBM has rearchitected its market leading threat detection and response portfolio to maximize speed and efficiency, and to meet the specific needs of today’s security analysts. The new IBM Security QRadar Suite includes EDR/XDR, SIEM, SOAR, ­and a new cloud-native log management capability – all built around a common user interface, shared insights and connected workflows, with the following core design elements:

  • Unified Analyst Experience: Refined in collaboration with hundreds of real-world users, the suite features a common, modernized user interface across all products: designed to dramatically increase analyst speed and efficiency across the entire attack chain. It is embedded with enterprise-grade AI and automation capabilities that have been shown to speed alert investigation and triage by 55% in the first year, on average.1
  • Cloud Delivery, Speed & Scale: Delivered as a service on Amazon Web Services (AWS), QRadar Suite products allow for simplified deployment, visibility and integration across cloud environments and data sources. The suite also includes a new, cloud-native log management capability optimized for highly efficient data ingestion, rapid search and analytics at scale.
  • Open Foundation, Pre-Built Integrations: The suite brings together the core technologies needed across threat detection, investigation and response – built around an open foundation, an extensive partner ecosystem, and more than 900 pre-built integrations that provide strong interoperability between IBM and third-party toolsets.

“In the face of a growing attack surface and shrinking attack timelines, speed and efficiency are fundamental to the success of resource-constrained security teams,” said Mary O’Brien, General Manager, IBM Security. “IBM has engineered the new QRadar Suite around a singular, modernized user experience, embedded with sophisticated AI and automation to maximize security analysts’ productivity and accelerate their response across each step of the attack chain.”

Co-innovation for Real-World Security Demands

The QRadar Suite is the culmination of years of IBM investment, acquisitions and innovations in threat detection and response. It features dozens of mature AI and automation capabilities that have been refined over time with real-world users and data, including IBM Managed Security Service engagements with more than 400 clients. It also includes innovations developed in collaboration with IBM Research and the open source security community.

These AI-powered capabilities have been shown to significantly improve the speed and accuracy of SOC operations: For example, allowing IBM Managed Security Services to automate more than 70% of alert closures[4] and reduce its alert triage timelines by 55%2 on average within the first year of implementation.

Bringing these capabilities together via the unified analyst experience, the QRadar Suite automatically contextualizes and prioritizes alerts, displays data in visual format for rapid consumption, and provides shared insights and automated workflows between products. This approach can drastically reduce the number of steps and screens required to investigate and respond to threats. Examples include:

  • AI-Powered Alert Triage: Automatically prioritizes or closes alerts based on AI-driven risk analysis, using AI models trained on prior analyst response patterns, along with external threat intelligence from IBM X-Force and broader contextual insights from across detection toolsets.
  • Automated Threat Investigation: Identifies high-priority incidents that may warrant investigation, and automatically initiates investigation by fetching associated artifacts and gathering evidence via data mining across environments. The system uses these results to generate a timeline and attack graph of the incident based on MITRE ATT&CK framework and recommends actions to speed response.
  • Accelerated Threat Hunting: Uses open source threat hunting language and federated search capabilities to help threat hunters discover stealthy attacks and indicators of compromise across their environments, without moving data from its original source.

By helping analysts respond faster and more efficiently, QRadar technologies can also help security teams improve their productivity and free up analysts’ time for higher value work.

Open, Connected and Modernized Security Suite

The QRadar Suite leverages open technologies and standards across the portfolio, alongside hundreds of pre-built integrations with IBM Security ecosystem partners. This model enables deeper shared insights and automated actions across third party clouds, point products, and data lakes, which can reduce deployment and integration times from months to days or weeks.

The IBM QRadar Suite includes the following core products, initially delivered as SaaS and updated with the new unified analyst experience:

  • QRadar Log Insights: A new, cloud-native log management and security observability solution providing simplified data ingestion, sub-second search and rapid analytics. It leverages an elastic security data lake optimized to collect, store and perform analytics on terabytes of data with greater speed and efficiency. It is designed for cost effective security log management alongside federated search and investigation.
  • QRadar EDR and XDR: Helps companies protect their endpoints against previously unknown, zero-day threats – using automation and hundreds of machine learning and behavioral models to detect behavioral anomalies and respond to attacks in near-real time. It leverages a unique approach that monitors operating systems from the outside, helping avoid manipulation or interference by adversaries. For companies looking to extend their detection and response capabilities beyond the endpoint, IBM also offers XDR with alert correlation, automated investigation, and recommended responses across network, cloud, email, and more, as well as managed detection and response (MDR).
  • QRadar SOAR: Recent winner of a Red Dot Design Award for interface & user experience; helps organizations automate and orchestrate incident response workflows and ensure their specific processes are followed in a consistent, optimized and measurable way. It includes 300 pre-built integrations and offers out of the box playbooks for responding to 180+ global data breach and privacy regulations.
  • QRadar SIEM: IBM’s market leading QRadar SIEM has been enhanced with the new unified analyst interface which provides shared insights and workflows with broader security operations toolsets. It offers real-time detection, leveraging AI, network and user behavior analytics, and real-world threat intelligence built to provide analysts with more accurate, contextualized and prioritized alerts. IBM also plans to make QRadar SIEM available as a service on AWS by the end of Q2 2023.

The IBM Security QRadar Suite is available today via individual SaaS offerings. For more information, visit: https://www.ibm.com/qradar

Statements regarding IBM’s future direction and intent are subject to change or withdrawal without notice, and represent goals and objectives only.

Moderna and IBM to Explore Quantum Computing and Generative AI for mRNA Science

CAMBRIDGE, MA and ARMONK, NY / April 20, 2023 / Moderna, Inc. (Nasdaq: MRNA), a biotechnology company pioneering messenger RNA (mRNA) therapeutics and vaccines, and IBM today announced an agreement under which Moderna will explore next generation technologies including quantum computing and artificial intelligence to advance and accelerate mRNA research and science.

“Since our inception, we have always strived to be at the forefront of cutting-edge technology, leveraging innovations to deliver the greatest possible impact to people through mRNA medicines,” said Stéphane Bancel, Chief Executive Officer of Moderna. “We are excited to partner with IBM to develop novel AI models to advance mRNA science, prepare ourselves for the era of quantum computing, and ready our business for these game-changing technologies. We are aiming for breakthrough advances with quantum computing, so we are investing now in building a quantum-ready workforce, to be fully prepared to harness the power of this technology.”

“IBM’s purpose is to be the catalyst to make the world work better, perfectly exemplified by this partnership with Moderna. We are witnessing a revolution in the world of computing, driven by extraordinary advances in AI and quantum computing,” said Dr. Darío Gil, Senior Vice President, and Director of IBM Research. “Moderna will be able to take advantage of our multi-year research efforts in generative AI for therapeutics that can allow scientists to better understand how molecules behave and may facilitate creating entirely new ones. We are also excited to work with Moderna to help prepare their scientists in the knowledge and use of IBM’s industry-leading quantum computing technologies with the goal of accelerating the discovery and creation of new therapeutics.”

Quantum computing skills development for mRNA medicine design

Quantum computing is a rapidly emerging and transformative technology that utilizes the principles of quantum mechanics to solve problems too complex for classical computers. Moderna scientists will learn how quantum technology could be applied to previously intractable problems for classical computers. Together, the companies will explore the potential application of quantum approaches to Moderna’s scientific challenges.

Moderna will participate in the IBM Quantum Accelerator program and the IBM Quantum Network. Under the agreement, IBM will provide access to quantum computing systems, as well as expertise to assist Moderna in exploring cutting-edge life sciences use-cases powered by quantum technologies.

AI models for mRNA medicine design

Moderna and IBM scientists will apply MoLFormer, an AI foundation model that can help scientists predict a molecule’s properties, and could help them understand the characteristics of potential mRNA medicines. Moderna’s goal will be to use MoLFormer to help optimize lipid nanoparticles, which encapsulate and protect mRNA as it travels within the body, and mRNA, which acts as instructions to cells in order to fight disease. Under this initiative, Moderna and IBM will combine state-of-the-art formulation discovery with generative AI to design mRNA medicines with optimal safety and performance.

New IBM Study Reveals Inadequate Data Hinders Progress Against Environmental, Social and Governance Goals

– Executives cite inadequate data (41%) as a top barrier holding back ESG progress
– Only 4 in 10 surveyed consumers feel they have enough data to make environmentally sustainable purchasing (41%) or employment (37%) decisions
Apr 17, 2023

ARMONK, N.Y.April 17, 2023 /PRNewswire/ — A new global IBM Institute for Business Value (IBV) study, “The ESG conundrum,” of executives and consumers reveals that while an increased focus on environmental sustainability remains a top priority for consumers and business executives, inadequate data is a key challenge for both groups when it comes to achieving personal and corporate Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) goals.

The study* reveals that surveyed executives point to inadequate data (41%) as the biggest obstacle to their ESG progress, followed by regulatory barriers (39%), inconsistent standards (37%) and inadequate skills (36%). Without the ability to access, analyze and understand ESG data, companies struggle to deliver greater transparency to the consumer – a key stakeholder – and meet consumer expectations.

Seventy-four percent of surveyed executives believe that stakeholders understand their organizations’ ESG objectives and performance, yet only about 4 in 10 surveyed consumers feel they have enough data to make environmentally sustainable purchasing (41%) or employment (37%) decisions.

“Consumer commitment to environmental sustainability and social responsibility has intensified with consumers voting with their wallets,” said Jonathan Wright, Global Managing Partner Sustainability Services and Global Business Transformation, IBM Consulting. “As a majority of consumers choose to buy from and work for ESG leaders, businesses must prioritize transparency and break down barriers to ESG data.”

Other study findings include:

Companies are investing in ESG and see it as good for business

  • 76% of surveyed executives say ESG is central to their business strategy.
  • Almost 3 in 4 surveyed executives (72%) view ESG as a revenue enabler rather than cost center, suggesting that contrary to popular opinion, ESG and profitability are not at odds.
  • 76% of executive respondents agree or strongly agree that their organization focuses on achieving ESG outcomes, not just reporting requirements.

Consumer commitment to sustainability has intensified, but consumers don’t feel they have sufficient information to make informed choices

  • Roughly two-thirds of surveyed consumers say environmental sustainability (68%) and social responsibility (65%) are very or extremely important to them.
    • While more than half (51%) of respondents say cost of living increases have made environmentally sustainable decisions more difficult in the last 12 months, roughly 6 in 10 say at least half of their purchases were branded environmentally sustainable or socially responsible.
    • Only 1 in 3 surveyed consumers say they have sufficient information to make sustainable investing and saving decisions.

Executives admit their companies haven’t made significant progress toward ESG goals, indicating data challenges impact their ability to measure progress and meet consumer demands 

  • 95% of surveyed executives say their organizations have developed ESG propositions; however, only 10% say that their organizations have made significant progress against them.
  • Almost 3 in 4 surveyed executives (73%) say their organizations struggle to manage an overload of manual data, while 7 in 10 say they have difficulty consolidating or manipulating data.

The study highlights ESG leaders, a sub-set of respondents with greater maturity in operationalizing ESG, who are seeing higher revenue, improved profitability, deeper customer engagement by approaching ESG as a transparency play that creates strategic business opportunities. These role models provide a roadmap for organizations looking to overcome data-related challenges and create sustainable change that includes: automating ESG processes and reporting capabilities to keep data current; tapping AI for enhanced insights into performance, forward looking analysis, and scenario development; aligning with ecosystem partners on ESG metric definitions and standards; and proactively establishing ESG data governance principles with stakeholders.

“Data is the lifeblood of ESG. Now is the time for enterprises to act. By operationalizing ESG plans, enterprises are putting information in the hands of operators who can make informed business decisions that can improve their ESG impact on a daily basis,” said Wright. “Organizations looking to increase stakeholder support and meet ESG reporting requirements should implement a sustainability roadmap that is inclusive of technologies, services and ecosystem partners that can position them for greater business success and help them address regulatory compliance,” said Wright.

To view the full study, visit: https://ibm.co/esg-ultimatum

*Study Methodology

The IBM Institute for Business Value (IBV) surveyed 2,500 executives from across 22 industries and 34 countries, delving into their organizations’ ESG strategy, approach, and operationalization; what benefits they expect from ESG initiatives; and how they weigh ESG against other business objectives. The IBV also surveyed more than 20,000 consumers across 34 countries about their attitudes toward sustainability and social responsibility, and how these beliefs influence shopping, investing, and career decisions.

EY and IBM Expand Strategic Alliance into Quantum Computing

LONDON and ARMONK, NY, April 13, 2023. The EY organization and IBM  today announced today that EY Global Services Limited will be joining the IBM Quantum Network, further enabling EY teams to explore solutions with IBM that could help resolve some of today’s most complex business and global challenges. The EY organization will gain access to IBM’s fleet of quantum computers over the cloud, and will become part of the IBM Quantum Network’s community of organizations working to advance quantum computing.

Quantum computing is a rapidly emerging technology that harnesses the laws of quantum mechanics to solve problems that today’s most powerful supercomputers cannot practically solve. EY teams will leverage their access to the world’s largest fleet of quantum computers to explore solutions to enterprise challenges across finance, oil and gas, healthcare, and government.

The EY organization established its own Global Quantum Lab last year with a mission to harness quantum value in the domains of trust, transformation, and sustainability. Using IBM quantum technology, EY teams plan to conduct leading-class research to uncover transformative use cases, including: the reduction of CO2 emissions from classical computing, the improvement of safety and accuracy of self-driving cars, and most critically, integrate quantum benefits into organizations’ mainstream systems for data processing and enterprise decision making.

Andy Baldwin, EY Global Managing Partner – Client Service, says:

“Quantum, in terms of importance to business, society and the EY organization, is akin to what AI represented years ago. This alliance puts the EY organization at the forefront of technology. As we invest in this level of quantum computing access, we accelerate our own position and depth of knowledge and capabilities in this space and deepen our rich relationship with our IBM alliance teams.”

Jeff Wong, EY Global Chief Innovation Officer, says:

“As we navigate this period of technology-led change, which is accelerating at unprecedented speed, companies must have a full understanding of how to maximize breakthrough innovations in order to keep pace. Through this relationship with IBM, the EY organization will now have the ability to take advantage of quantum computing to propel its innovation journey.”

Jay Gambetta, Vice President, IBM Quantum, says:

“IBM’s vision is to deliver useful quantum computing to the world. We value partners like the EY organization that can introduce the emerging technology to a wide ecosystem of public and private industry. This will help EY facilitate the exploration of quantum computing’s potential for use cases that matter in their industry.”

Membership in the IBM Quantum Network is part of a broader effort by the EY organization to invest and develop robust capabilities in emerging technologies, which already include artificial intelligence, blockchain, and metaverse development. Beyond the increased investment of the EY-IBM Alliance, the EY organization is investing $10 billion in technology initiatives over three years, including investment in the organization’s own quantum function.

IBM Releases IBM Impact Report 2022

ARMONK, N.Y., April 11, 2023/ — IBM today announced the release of its 2022 IBM Impact report, which includes the company’s information about its environmental, social and governance efforts.

In 2022, IBM launched the IBM Impact framework -its strategy on ESG- with its Environmental Impact, Equitable Impact, and Ethical Impact pillars that reflect IBM’s achievements, and strategies to build a future that is more sustainable, equitable, and ethical.

Highlights from the 2022 IBM Impact report include:

  • IBM exceeded our target to train 1,000 ecosystem partners in technology ethics. We are also launching a new commitment to train 1,000 suppliers in technology ethics by 2025.
  • We are making progress on our commitment to invest $250 million in IBM’s skills-first transformation with a focus on multiple pathways to employment. We have hired over 900 apprentices through our apprenticeship program in the U.S. and more than 90% of past program graduates have become full-time IBM employees.
  • Advancing on our goal to skill 30 million people by 2030,  over 7 million learners have enrolled in free IBM courses through our combined education initiatives. For example, we are collaborating with over 20 historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) on IBM Cybersecurity Leadership Centers.
  • IBM’s diversity practices have resulted in a year-over-year increase in representation for women globally and Black, Hispanic, Native American and Pan-Asian employees in the U.S.
  • IBM made progress towards our goal of net-zero operational greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. In 2021, we reported a 61.6% reduction in emissions since 2010. Over the last two years, IBM completed a total of 1,455 energy conservation projects. As a result of the conservation projects implemented in 2022, we avoided 71,000 MWh of energy consumption and 25,600 metric tons of COemissions.
  • IBM diverted 93.8% (by weight) of IBM’s total nonhazardous waste from landfill or incineration.

“While we are proud of the progress we have made, we are mindful that advancing our environmental, social, and governance goals is a continuous journey of improvement,” said Arvind Krishna, IBM Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. “I am always inspired by IBMers’ constant dedication to this essential work and their pursuit of a better future for all.”

As a 111 year-old-company, IBM has a long history of commitments that align business goals with broader societal and environmental impact. For example, IBM’s first environmental report was released in 1990, and the company has championed diverse hiring practices for more than 50 years.