Zscaler becomes a member of the Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative

Zscaler on Monday announced that it had become a member of the Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative (JCDC), underscoring the company’s commitment to play a more prominent role in the nation’s overall cybersecurity posture.

Established last year by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the JCDC works to develop joint cyber defense plans and operations through partnerships with the private sector, federal government, and state, local, tribal and territorial governments.

“Today, digital transformation has accelerated organizations’ move to cloud-based SaaS models and the internet is now the new corporate network — rendering 30 years of networking and security principles ineffective,” said Jay Chaudhry, founder, CEO and chairman of Zscaler. “We are honored to be working with JCDC to leverage the threat intelligence in Zscaler’s zero-trust platform to help stop large-scale cyberattacks, prevent data exfiltration, and block debilitating ransomware attempts.”

The JCDC’s initial industry partners included the following: Amazon Web Services, AT&T, Crowdstrike, FireEye Mandiant, Google Cloud, Lumen, Microsoft, Palo Alto Networks, and Verizon. Government partners include the Department of Defense, U.S. Cyber Command, the National Security Agency, the Department of Justice, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

The goal of the U.S. federal government is to improve the country’s cybersecurity by applying actionable threat intelligence at scale,” said Davis McCarthy, principal security researcher at Valtix.

“Network defense is something state, local, tribal and territorial entities have not traditionally had the opportunity or budget to explore,” said McCarthy. “With CISA establishing the JCDC and partnering with strategic vendors, governmentwide collaboration may actually help mitigate advanced threats in the long-term.”