Kasya appoints a former FBI agent as their Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) in a new development.

In a move to strengthen its cybersecurity measures, software provider Kaseya has announced the appointment of Jason Manar as its new Chief Information Security Officer (CISO). Manar, who most recently served as a cyber supervisory special agent within the FBI, will oversee Kaseya's information security and compliance, including ensuring global government compliance.

The appointment comes after Kaseya was targeted in a supply chain cyberattack by the REvil ransomware group. The attack, which occurred in July, impacted fewer than 1,500 downstream customers, with at least 50 customers being directly compromised using Kaseya's on-premise version of Virtual System Administrator (VSA) software.

Prior to the attack, Kaseya did not have a CISO. The company worked closely with Manar during the response efforts following the attack, and was reportedly impressed with his qualifications and handling of the situation.

The VSA software had multiple exploitable vulnerabilities, which allowed REvil to revisit the company, according to a Bloomberg report. The report also claimed that Kaseya rarely patched its software or servers and stored customer passwords in clear text on third-party platforms.

Former Kaseya software engineers and development employees have criticised the company's executives for failing to address security concerns, such as outdated code and weak encryption practices.

Interestingly, REvil vanished from the internet shortly after Kaseya obtained the universal decryptor. It is worth noting that GandCrab was the original group moniker for REvil. At least two more incidents involving GandCrab and Sodinokibi were reported by former employees to have occurred in 2018 and 2019.

Karen Sandhu was appointed as director of security operations at Kaseya, and Dan Timpson, Kaseya's former CTO, is now responsible for product development, security, and cloud operations. Rick Orloff, Kaseya's former CSO and SVP of Operations, left the company in June 2020.

Manar, who oversaw cyber and counterintelligence in the FBI's San Diego office, is expected to thrive in turbulent situations, according to Forrester. This quality will no doubt be valuable in Kaseya's ongoing efforts to strengthen its cybersecurity measures and regain the trust of its customers.