#fragglestorm

Providers of financial and related services have a unique requirement for security of data placed upon them by the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission), FINRA (Financial Industry Regulatory Authority) and various state privacy laws such as the CPAA (California Consumer Privacy Act) recently in effect on January 1, 2020. These agencies, rules and acts require a stringent adherence to protection of data of clients, maintaining privacy, and a strict reporting policy of breaches.

Recent revelations that hackers have bypassed even two factor authentication (2FA) methods demonstrate the need to seek out the best security solutions to prevent theft of data, and the tremendous costs (fines, client loss, etc.) associated with hacker breaches and ransomware. The financial services industry contributed 62% of exposed data in 2019 and has the second-highest cost per breached record, behind healthcare. The United States has the highest costs in the world for data breaches, costing an average of $8.19 million or about $249 per record. Fragglestorm aids in providing secure management of access to financial files and data. It assures data is available and resilient even after a ransomware attack to protect an organization from the penalties of such attacks. Fragglestorm provides several core functions that address the needs of those faced with providing services in the Financial Services field:

Data is always secured by use of:

o Encryption

Data is encrypted according to user-selected algorithms and keys

Cybervore has no backdoor method to access encrypted data or otherwise recover owner’s lost keys

o Smart Data Fragmentation™

The data is fragmented as specified making it impossible to be of use to a hacker even if copied

This is comparable to going to a puzzle store and dumping all the puzzle pieces on the floor

A hacker can’t determine what piece goes with another piece to even begin encryption cracking

Fragglestorm fragments are smart, a.k.a. Smart Fragments™

Any fragments missing (with replication) will be automatically recreated

Fragments can be reassembled into files without the control database

The authentication credentials must be presented

Only an authorized data portion in use (in memory) is ever viewable outside of Fragglestorm'

Data is kept highly available by replication

Loss of access to a given storage location is transparently handled with no user or IT intervention Data is resilient by versioning

o Ransomware attacks - Once the ransomware has been contained, a Fragglestorm utility can identify attacked files and automatically revert the last ‘good’ copy in place

o This function allows rapid recovery from ransomware infections

Managed Data Distribution for supporting data transition to multiple cloud services

o Fragglestorm can actively aid in management of storage in hybrid multicloud storage environments

o Data according to specified filters, and parameters can be distributed across cloud, and local storage to specification

Interfaces with everything

o The main interface is presented as a letter-drive, such as a C:\, in Microsoft Windows

Any number of drives may be defined

Each drive can have different end storage configurations with Geolocation specifications (if supported by storage location)

Each drive can have different fragmentation, replication, and versioning specified

o Allows any activity or process to be performed in a secure manner

The data is always protected

Results of operations are automatically protected in real time by simply locating them on the defined drive

Allows indexing and other operations to occur without loss of protection on the data

Resultant indexes and metadata are automatically secured

Indexing occurs across all cloud location and storage devices transparently

Data Sharing

o Fragglestorm provides for data sharing and access to multiple users

o Several users can be defined for every defined drive

Each user can have different defined levels of access

Recommended to prevent one user from controlling access to data

o Select folders and files can be shared securely via methods similar to Google Drive, Dropbox, and etc.

Performance

o Fragglestorm was designed with performance as a primary requirement, the user sees no change in speed

o Utilization of low level operating system components provides the highest level of security possible

o Fragglestorm provides the user the same performance experience by utilizing low level operating system methods

Recently our CEO Frederick Callis was interviewed by CEOCFO Magazine. Learn more about Cybervore and our next product - Fragglestorm!

CEOCFO: Mr. Callis, what is Cybervore™?

Mr. Callis: Cybervore is a cybersecurity software company. We make a product called Fragglestorm™ which provides a secure method to help businesses transition their data to cloud services. How secure? It makes data useless to any unauthorized person- only an authorized user can access their data. Cool, right?

CEOCFO: How does Fragglestorm go beyond encryption?  

Mr. Callis: Well, encryption jumbles the actual data but keeps the data all together. Through certain brute-force technologies, today’s encryption can be compromised. Soon, through the commercialization of quantum computing, encryption will become handicapped and broken.

To protect and manage data in today’s multicloud services world, the Fragglestorm process takes the actual data, uses the encryption but then fragments the data into multiple puzzle-like pieces. We then wrap technology around those pieces, thereby making the ‘data smart’, which by the way, we call Smart Fragments™. As such, these smart fragments become impossible to break or reassemble unless you are the authorized user.

For example, if a document was stolen or compromised in any way, even if the encryption is broken, the hackers only have a very small piece of the puzzle. It gets better. Let’s take lots of data in general and all of these are turned into smart fragments. If we dump them all together, you can start to see how hard it is to hack through or try to break them. Finally, let’s make it even more difficult. Let’s place those pieces in different locations across storage devices or cloud services. As a result, Fragglestorm allows the data to become ultra-secure and hardened against being broken or useful by any bad actors.

CEOCFO: Is this a novel approach? Has it been tried before? Is it in use now in other ways?  

Mr. Callis:  Yes.  Think of how data is stored on a disc drive on any computer. Data is separated into pieces on a disc drive which allows the data to be stored more efficiently. However, when you put data on a network or cloud service, you are outside the data center which is why businesses are so concerned about security and resiliency. Regarding how it is in use in other ways, up until recently, encrypting the data was good enough. But times are changing and we believe encryption plus Fragglestorm can fill the void specifically against encryption-breaking systems such as quantum computing.

Our approach enables the fragments themselves to reassemble into a file when authenticated credentials are presented. In today’s marketplace other companies may use fragmentation, but no one has developed software that simultaneously assures availability, accessibility, security and ransomware recovery into one product. CEOCFO: How do you create a system that will do this? How do you separate the data and how do you put it back together?  

Mr. Callis: It is based upon mathematical algorithms and processes. There is a lot of detail that goes into how fragments are made and how they are made smart. They are connected almost a little bit like the blockchain concept, but it is not public blockchain. It is more of a private blockchain built for performance. As such, a smart fragment would know another smart fragment; how they all go together. You cannot even come up with fake fragments, because they are intelligent to each other. Awesome, right? CEOCFO: Who is using this?  

Mr. Callis: Right now we are a software startup. We have early adopter customers that wish to remain anonymous and we have a product release scheduled for the end of this year. CEOCFO: Who would be the most likely types of companies, industries or size of organizations that you would be targeting? Who needs this more than others?   Mr. Callis: Our initial target market is small to medium-size businesses. They are the biggest targets of cybercriminals and we can help them the most. As far as industry verticals: healthcare, financial services, and legal/accounting.  

CEOCFO: Would you be working through MSPs or would you be looking at reaching the end customer directly?  

Mr. Callis: We work through both MSPs and carriers to offer Fragglestorm. They are market-positioned between their users and cloud services which makes them ideal to work with. Fragglestorm offers MSPs and carriers new ways to further protect their customers as they transition their data to multiple cloud providers. To them, this is a competitive value.

CEOCFO: When you are speaking to the right person, do they recognize the concept and the effectiveness?  

Mr. Callis: Yes. The example I use is: take your name and social security number as one saved document. By using Fragglestorm, the document is encrypted and then fragmented. Those pieces are wrapped in our secret sauce, copied or replicated as well as versioned into multiple copies. These pieces are then intelligently stored across different locations which could include on-premise devices, PCs/servers, or multiple cloud services. The value here is even if the data is stolen, the hackers only have a piece - if they can break it. That is how Fragglestorm makes data ultra-secure and manageable anywhere. CEOCFO: Would this be in conjunction with other security measures? How does this come together?  

Mr. Callis: We complement other security solutions - we do not replace them. In other words, sometimes the hackers get in or a virus infects computers and servers. They will always need other security products to help them. We are the last line of defense. What we do is make the data useless to any unauthorized user no matter where the data is located; only an authorized user can access and reassemble their data. CEOCFO: Are you seeking funding, partnership or investment as you move forward?  

Mr. Callis: Yes. We need money to grow. We have a great management team which is experienced in building new businesses. But in this cybersecurity marketplace, rapid growth requires capital and strategic alliances. It takes a village. We are in a business where hopefully, a.k.a. through hard work, we can align with the right lead investment firm.

CEOCFO: When did you recognize that this was the way to go as a product? When did you recognize this was something needed and that you could do it?  

Mr. Callis: About two years ago, we were awarded a patent for Smart Data Fragmentation™ after years of researching and looking deeper into the security and management of data. We found so many businesses were getting hacked or ransomed regardless of all the security products they had installed. We also noticed that corporate hacks and breach reports were showing up on national and global news channels, not just on tech news. With the rise of quantum-computing which greatly handicaps encryption and the ongoing exposure to financial penalties, legal, and compliance problems, we concluded there is a huge growing market place for smart data fragmentation. CEOCFO: There are so many ideas to look at regarding cyber security. Why Cybervore now?

Mr. Callis: Data is a business’s most important asset and it is also a huge liability. Today’s basic business operations and intelligence require data to be safe and resilient. If they cannot get to their data to make decisions or operate, they are out of business. This is especially true for small to medium-sized businesses which are the fastest-growing piece of the U.S. economy.

Fragglestorm can help businesses simplify their access to multiple cloud services while keeping their data safe because there is protection no matter where the data is located.