IBM has announced a new cybersecurity testing facility for its X-Force Red ethical hacking team at its campus in Austin, Texas, alongside three further testing sites, in Atlanta, Georgia, in the US, Hursley, England, in the UK, and Melbourne, in Australia.
The network of facilities, called X-Force Red Labs, will be dedicated to testing devices and systems, including both consumer and industrial internet-of-thing (IoT) technologies and automotive equipment, IBM said at the Black Hat Conference in Last Vegas.
X-Force Red, the veteran hacker team established two years ago within the company’s security unit, has also launched an ATM Testing practice in response to higher demand for secure financial transaction systems.
IBM said its hackers are hired to “think like the bad guys” and find flaws in products before they are installed in homes and workplaces, including machine-led industrial settings. “IBM X-Force Red has one mission – hack anything to secure everything,” said Charles Henderson, global managing partner, at IBM X-Force Red.
“Via X-Force Red Labs, we have the ability to do just that, in a secure and controlled environment. Whether it’s the newest smart phone, an internet-connected refrigerator or a new ATM, we have the capability to test, identify, and help our clients remediate vulnerabilities before the bad guys can exploit them.”
IBM quoted research from the Ponemon Institute that post-production software fixes are 29 times more costly for organisations than fixing errors during the design phase. Services offered by IBM’s new X-Force Red Labs include mapping product requirements, in-depth technical analysis, threat modelling, and penetrating testing.
