Cisco unveiled its unified platform, dubbed Security Cloud, to integrate security and networking services across hybrid multicloud environments for the entire IT ecosystem. The networking giant also officially named its secure access service edge (SASE) offerings as Cisco+ Secure Connect Now, and added a new Talos Intelligence On-Demand service.

Cisco Security Cloud is a set of cloud-based services that provides threat detection and prevention, minimizes cyber risks, and integrates breach response and remediation with machine learning technology, Jeetu Patel, EVP and GM of security and collaboration at Cisco, told SDxCentral.

This platform operates in a hybrid, multicloud environment; has a unified policy engine for multiple different products and services; and uses machine learning for predictive inference on what breaches might occur, he added.   

“It starts initially as a concept that turns into a skewer service,” Patel noted, which built on Cisco’s existing security and networking services as the core components.

“We've already got the core platform that we've been building over the course of the past few years. What we're now doing is integrating the piece parts in a way that it looks to you as though it's just one solid system,” he said. “And that's what we want to do is deliver a security cloud which is fully integrated, not just within the security components, but also with networking.”

The vendor claims Cisco Security Cloud is the most open security platform with no public cloud lock-in and has open APIs to enable third-party solutions.

One of the key components of the Cisco Security Cloud is its unified SASE platform, now called Cisco+ Secure Connect Now. 

Cisco launched its network-as-a-service (NaaS) platform Cisco Plus last March, putting the vendor one step closer to realizing CEO Chuck Robbins’ promise to move the company’s entire portfolio to a subscription model. The platform rolled out hybrid cloud and SASE as the first two major offerings at the onset.

Now the SASE has become part of the Cisco+ Secure Connect Now, which is “a combination of Meraki capabilities from the SD-WAN standpoint and our Umbrella security capabilities, and merging them into one offering,” Patel explained.  

This as-a-service subscription can be managed through a unified dashboard. “It is not just a bundling exercise. This is a deep technical integration where you would have a single dashboard,” he added. 

Cisco’s SASE model is labeled by Dell’Oro Group as a “disaggregated” platform instead of a more cohesive “unified” platform, which means the vendor has chosen to offer a multi-vendor SASE architecture in collaboration with partners. 

“We will still be able to go out and integrate with other third parties, either on the SD-WAN side or on the security side, but what this does is it provides you the definition of SASE from a single place, and makes sure that when you buy all of those pieces, they just work effectively together,” Patel said.

In addition to securing the edge, Cisco Security Cloud also works to secure access for the hybrid work model. 

The vendor aims to offer next-generation zero trust under the notion of continuous trusted access by constantly verifying user and device identity, device posture, vulnerabilities, and indicators of compromise.

As part of this plan, Cisco launched Wi-Fi Fingerprint as an effective location proxy that does not compromise user privacy. This new feature addresses the challenges of applying policy based on geography because it tracks service set identifiers (SSIDs) for detecting location changes, Patel explained.  

On top of that, Cisco built a feature called session trust analysis using the open Shared Signals and Events standards to share information between vendors to evaluate risk after the user logs in. 

In addition, the vendor announced that its Talos threat intelligence offerings now include an on-demand service that provides custom research on the threat landscape that is unique to each organization rather than just generic data, according to Patel.

For example, the Cisco Talos team can provide custom research on the latest news reports about a certain ransomware group or known exploited vulnerabilities, and offer an analyst to brief the customer on risks, threat profiles, and mitigation strategies based on their environment, he said.

To simplify the portfolio management, Cisco also introduced the new unified Secure Client, which offers a single agent for AnyConnect, Secure Endpoint, and Umbrella by mid-year, with more elements to be added. 

“We connect people to the internet, and that's what we do at Cisco,” Patel concluded. “We are the world leader in networking, but we're also one of the largest vendors in security in the world. And there's a reason for that. That's not just a coincidence. It's because networking without security doesn't make any sense, and those two stacks are actually getting much more converged now than ever before.”