Buy-Side Technology Awards 2015: Best Buy-Side Cyber-Security Platform/Tool—ACA Aponix
![aca-cyber aca-cyber](/sites/default/files/styles/landscape_750_463/public/import/IMG/018/336018/aca-cyber-580x358.jpeg.webp?itok=-EjWE5JQ)
Long gone are the days when a firewall breach was considered the most severe threat, or a zero-breach strategy was deemed reasonable. Today, it’s more about protect, monitor and react.
This new problem is more acute for the buy side. The lion’s share of investment managers, while still targets, don’t have the elastic operating budgets to push toward security that banks do—particularly banks with retail units. It’s yet another area of technology where investment managers have no choice but to seek help, rather than build their own solutions.
Enter Aponix. Between the new-age “advanced” platforms and more traditional ones, Aponix probably falls into the latter category, and the judges looked kindly upon this.
After all, cyber experts regularly tell us that capital markets firms’ biggest vulnerability is their own people, and that the biggest breaches use rudimentary, almost antique-sounding, phishing methods to sneak their way into systems. Helping its 75 clients to regularly examine and test those methods against their personnel, using a cloud-based approach, is one of the things Aponix does best.
A second area the judges appreciated was help with vendor due diligence. Again, this may not be the sexiest aspect of cyber-defense; however, it’s one that every buy-side shop must cope with as their boards, leadership and upstream investors continue to worry about new threat vectors coming from outside the firm’s walls. No one operates completely in a bubble, and therefore convening with and assessing providers’ readiness is almost as important as testing one’s own.
Between the new-age “advanced” platforms and more traditional ones, Aponix probably falls into the latter category, and the judges looked kindly upon this. After all, cyber experts regularly tell us that capital markets firms’ biggest vulnerability is their own people, and that the biggest breaches use rudimentary, almost antique-sounding, phishing methods to sneak their way into systems.
This often-unruly process is an annoying one to manage on one’s own—typical due-diligence questionnaires can include hundreds, even thousands, of questions—and we found Aponix’s tailored approach to handling it on a consulting basis as a good way forward.
Where cyber goes is always contingent on tomorrow’s newspaper—priorities in this space can change overnight. But getting the old-school tasks right is foundational to an effective strategy going forward, no matter how sophisticated attacks or defenses become.
Only users who have a paid subscription or are part of a corporate subscription are able to print or copy content.
To access these options, along with all other subscription benefits, please contact info@waterstechnology.com or view our subscription options here: http://subscriptions.waterstechnology.com/subscribe
You are currently unable to print this content. Please contact info@waterstechnology.com to find out more.
You are currently unable to copy this content. Please contact info@waterstechnology.com to find out more.
Copyright Infopro Digital Limited. All rights reserved.
As outlined in our terms and conditions, https://www.infopro-digital.com/terms-and-conditions/subscriptions/ (point 2.4), printing is limited to a single copy.
If you would like to purchase additional rights please email info@waterstechnology.com
Copyright Infopro Digital Limited. All rights reserved.
You may share this content using our article tools. As outlined in our terms and conditions, https://www.infopro-digital.com/terms-and-conditions/subscriptions/ (clause 2.4), an Authorised User may only make one copy of the materials for their own personal use. You must also comply with the restrictions in clause 2.5.
If you would like to purchase additional rights please email info@waterstechnology.com
More on Awards & Rankings
Waters Rankings 2024: Best performance measurement and attribution system provider—FactSet
Product/service: FactSet Performance Solutions
IMD & IRD Awards 2024 winner's interview: Tradeweb
Tradeweb won Most innovative market data project in this year’s Inside Market Data & Inside Reference Data Awards.
IMD & IRD Awards 2024 winner's interview: S&P Global Market Intelligence
S&P Global Market Intelligence won Best corporate actions data initiative in this year’s Inside Market Data & Inside Reference Data Awards.
Waters Rankings 2024: Best outsourcing service provider—Northern Trust
Product/service: Integrated Trading Solutions
Waters Rankings 2024: Best cloud infrastructure provider—IPC Systems
Product/service: Connexus Cloud
Waters Rankings 2024: Best buy-side order management system (OMS) provider—SS&C Technologies
Product/service: Eze OMS
Waters Rankings 2024: Best reconciliation management provider—Duco
Product/service: Duco platform