Local managed services provider Brennan IT has been tapped by the Australian Cyber Emergency Response Team (AusCERT) as its 2018 member organisation of the year.

The award recognises that Brennan IT fixed the largest percentage of vulnerabilities or incidents reported by AusCERT through its member security incident notifications (MSINs).

AusCERT provides information security advice to its members, which includes a range of organisations including those in the higher education sector. The organisation describes itself as ‘a single point of contact' for dealing with cybersecurity incidents affecting or involving member networks. On top of MSINs, members receive incident management service, regular security bulletins and a malicious URL feed that lets members add malicious websites to their firewalls. Stephen Sims, CEO, Brennan IT says the recognition from AusCERT is especially meaningful due to the fact that it is based purely on performance and numbers.

“Combatting cyber risks is a key strategic business issue for organisations around the world. Like many other businesses, Brennan IT continues to search for ways to proactively improve cybersecurity across the organisation,” Sims says.

“This award recognises that the business has done that successfully and, although the work will never be done with regard to cybersecurity, it confirms Brennan IT's ongoing proactive commitment to security.

Sims also says his company prides itself on robust security practices that enable effective customer service and threat detection proficiency.

“Brennan IT subscribes to the Australian Signals Directorate's (ASD) cybersecurity guidelines known as the ‘Essential Eight',” Sims continues.

“We've designed our security capabilities around these ‘Essential Eight' so our customers know their IT environment has the highest security in place."

Brennan IT offers a range of security managed services that aim to cover the complete ICT environment, including network security, email security and security consulting. The company says it takes a multi-layered approach to cybersecurity to protect from attacks stemming from a wide range of sources.