Enhanced Ransomware Detection Through Trend Micro and Intel Collaboration
On January 7, 2025, Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in cybersecurity, announced a significant partnership with Intel Corporation at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Dallas. This collaboration aims to enhance the security of enterprise systems against sophisticated cyber threats, including fileless malware and advanced ransomware.
CES is one of the world’s most influential technology events, and this announcement highlights the importance of cybersecurity in today’s digital landscape. The partnership between Trend Micro and Intel is set to provide joint enterprise customers with robust protection for their critical systems against stealthy cyber threats.
Integrated Security Solution
The integrated solution combines Trend Micro’s proactive security platform with Intel’s advanced technology. This partnership allows for a more efficient determination of encryption behavior to distinguish between legitimate activities, like file backups, and malicious actions. This capability is crucial for protecting critical systems from potential threats.
Panel Discussion at CES 2025
During CES 2025, Intel and Trend Micro will engage corporate attendees in a panel discussion titled "Data Collection, Privacy and Why You Should Care." This event is set for January 9 and will offer insights on safeguarding digital footprints as cybercriminals target increasingly critical data. Interested participants can register online to join this informative session.
Insights from Industry Leaders
Carla Rodriguez, Vice President at Intel, emphasized the growing threat to endpoints from sophisticated attacks that bypass traditional software-based security measures. She noted that the integration of Intel® Threat Detection Technology (TDT) with Trend Micro’s solutions provides a hardware-accelerated detection layer. This technology is unique in its AI-based silicon security capabilities and is already deployed across a billion PCs worldwide. The collaboration promises enhanced protection for customers using Trend’s AI-powered endpoint solutions on Intel AI PCs.
The Rising Threat of Fileless Malware
Securing critical assets across various platforms—endpoints, email, networks, and cloud workloads—has become increasingly challenging. Malicious actors are favoring covert threats like fileless malware, which in 2023 was reportedly involved in 40% of cyberattacks. These threats can deploy ransomware, steal sensitive information, and cause substantial financial and reputational damage.
Fileless attacks are particularly dangerous because they execute in-memory, reside in the system registry, or exploit legitimate tools like PowerShell and Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI). This makes them harder to detect and neutralize using traditional security measures.
The Power of AI and Hardware Security
Trend Micro and Intel are combining their strengths to provide organizations with powerful tools to detect and respond to ransomware and fileless attacks before they can cause significant damage. Rachel Jin, Chief Enterprise Platform Officer at Trend, highlighted that proactive security is now achievable, thanks to this collaboration. The partnership aims to empower businesses to protect their systems, data, and operations against an increasingly complex threat landscape.
Advanced Memory Scanning (AMS)
The partnership leverages Intel’s Advanced Memory Scanning (AMS) technology, which offloads scanning workloads from the CPU to the GPU. This shift enables Trend’s endpoint security solutions to perform deeper and more frequent scans, improving the detection of fileless attacks before they can execute malicious payloads. By using fewer CPU resources, this approach enhances threat detection and response without impacting system performance, slowing down PCs, or reducing battery life.
Trend Vision One – Endpoint Security uses AMS to boost memory scanning capacity by up to 10 times. This increase allows organizations to conduct more scans and detect more threats, thereby bolstering their security posture.
CPU-Based Threat Detection
As ransomware becomes more sophisticated, evading detection through techniques like packing and obfuscation, traditional Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) solutions often struggle to keep pace. Intel® TDT enhances Trend’s behavioral analysis, machine learning, and expert rules by providing critical visibility into the hardware layer, increasing ransomware detection efficacy by 24% compared to software-only solutions.
This improved detection is achieved by:
- Utilizing CPU telemetry and Intel® AI to offload AI and memory scanning tasks from the CPU to the integrated GPU.
- Integrating Intel TDT source code directly into the Trend Micro agent, allowing for deeper insights from CPU telemetry. This integration facilitates the instant discovery of zero-day attacks and rapidly evolving threat variants.
About Trend Micro
Trend Micro is a global cybersecurity leader dedicated to making the world safe for the exchange of digital information. With decades of security expertise, global threat research, and continuous innovation, Trend Micro’s AI-powered cybersecurity platform protects hundreds of thousands of organizations and millions of individuals across clouds, networks, devices, and endpoints.
As a leader in cloud and enterprise cybersecurity, Trend Micro’s platform delivers a comprehensive range of advanced threat defense techniques optimized for environments like AWS, Microsoft, and Google. It also provides centralized visibility for more effective and faster detection and response. With a workforce of 7,000 employees across 70 countries, Trend Micro empowers organizations to simplify and secure their connected world.
For more information about Trend Micro and its cybersecurity solutions, visit www.TrendMicro.com.
Conclusion
The collaboration between Trend Micro and Intel represents a significant advancement in the fight against cyber threats. By combining AI-powered software with hardware-accelerated detection, the partnership offers businesses an enhanced security solution capable of addressing the sophisticated threats of today’s digital world. As cybercriminals continue to evolve their tactics, such proactive and integrated approaches to cybersecurity are essential for safeguarding critical systems and data.
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