Sophos announced that deep learning driven malware detection is now available through its Intercept X early access program. This deep learning capability has been developed using technology from Invincea, acquired by Sophos in February 2017.
First released in September 2016, Sophos Intercept X is a next-generation endpoint security product that stops zero-day malware, blocks all exploit techniques known today and includes an advanced anti-ransomware feature that can stop both known and unknown ransomware variants within seconds. Deployed through the cloud-based management platform Sophos Central, Intercept X can be installed alongside existing endpoint security software from any vendor, immediately boosting endpoint protection by stopping malicious code before it can do harm.
Deep learning is a branch of machine learning and artificial intelligence that leverages an artificial neural network to build a model used to make predictions with speed, scale, and judgement that exceed human capabilities. The deep neural network of Intercept X is trained on hundreds of millions of samples to detect when a file is malicious, potentially unwanted, or legitimate. Deep learning is more effective than traditional machine learning approaches because of its larger scale training set, smaller model, and more effective detections.
“The real-world effectiveness of Intercept X was proven by its proactive protection of customers during the WannaCry outbreak, and now we are taking that zero-day malware detection to the next level,” commented Dan Schiappa, general manager and senior vice president of the Enduser and Network Security groups at Sophos. “More advanced than conventional machine learning, Sophos’ deep learning systems can scale to hundreds of millions of training examples, meaning our technology can ‘memorize’ the observable threat landscape as part of its training process. This dramatically improves detection results for new and unique malware without the volume of false-positives that other products produce. This is the next step in the implementation of deep-learning techniques across our portfolio. Our early adopter customers have already installed this enhanced detection and we are now broadening access to this technology through the Intercept X early access program.”
