3 Tips for MSPs Managing Cybersecurity Vendor Sprawl

Vendor sprawl, or the accumulation of multiple point security solutions from different vendors, can cause massive inefficiencies and unnecessary costs for an MSP. Here, we share three practical tips to help you combat this perennial problem or avoid it altogether.

Why Cybersecurity Vendor Sprawl May Have Seemed Inevitable

Organizations looking to handle various use cases and threats often accumulate multiple tools over time, not realizing there are other options. However, an assembly of disparate security solutions lacks coherence. This means, it’s possible for a threat to be detected by several tools but remain unflagged simply because each detection lacks context.

Besides the ineffectiveness, these solutions also come at a cost, and acquisition expenses are only the beginning. Having a collection of point solutions can also put undue strain on an MSP’s operational costs. That’s because you’re forced to hire:

• Multiple IT staff who each specialize on specific tools;
• A smaller but more highly skilled team or individual (with understandably much higher rates) that can operate several tools; or
• Multiple vendors that can help you manage different components of your security stack.

Hiring the required talent alone presents a huge challenge because of the existing talent gap in cybersecurity. A recent study estimates the number of unfilled cybersecurity jobs around the world at more than 4.07 million.

But what causes vendor sprawl in the first place? Is it something that can be avoided?

In the previous cybersecurity landscape, probably not. That landscape was plagued with a proliferation of various point security solutions, each designed to address a specific use case or threat. And because businesses are indeed faced with various use cases and threats, organizations had no choice but to purchase a point solution for one use case and continue doing so as each new use case came along.

What the industry lacked was an all-inclusive cybersecurity offering that consolidates best-of-breed security tools and addresses a broader range of threats and use cases. Today, however, it’s a different story. Cybersecurity platforms now exist that can do just that.

Before you go and start searching cybersecurity platforms, we recommend taking a look at these practical tips to combat vendor sprawl without breaking the bank.

Tip No. 1: Define your cybersecurity strategy.

An IBM report states that enterprise businesses deploy an average of 45 cybersecurity-related tools to protect data and applications. That’s just too much. Too many security tools can cause alert fatigue. There has to be a better way, right?  Click on Page 2 to continue reading…