Source Defense, the pioneer and market leader in web application client-side protection and data privacy compliance, announced the appointment of Ross Hogan to the position of Chief Executive Officer. The appointment comes at a time of accelerated growth for Source Defense which now protects a community of hundreds of the world’s leading brands from the online theft and leakage of sensitive data, mitigates billions of potential compliance violations, and secures tens of billions in annual online revenues. It also comes as data privacy regulators have begun requiring Source Defense’s unique approach to website data security and privacy for compliance with standards such as the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS).
Hogan was a founding team member of Source Defense as its initial Chief Business Officer. He now rejoins the organization as Chief Executive Officer. He brings with him more than twenty years of Go-to-Market and Product Development leadership experience in the fraud prevention and cybersecurity industries. Hogan specializes in architecting companies that grow far faster than their market spaces by emphasizing a community driven approach to product development and a fanatical focus on customer success. This approach assures the highest customer satisfaction ratings and customer retention metrics in the industry. He has brought market leading growth to companies such as Cybersixgill, Kaspersky Lab, and Trusteer.
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“I’m elated to rejoin Source Defense at a time when its mission is more important than ever,” said Ross Hogan, Chief Executive Officer at Source Defense. “We exist to put an end to the theft and leakage of sensitive data from modern websites and our mission could not be more important at current. Visa just recently warned of a massive 176% increase in eSkimming attacks; the PCI Security Standards Council recently made addressing these attacks a core requirement for millions of firms that must comply; and high-profile lawsuits related to 3rd parties accessing sensitive data from websites – like the one involving Meta – have gripped the news. We have a solution to the problem which is simple, effective and places virtually no additional burden on already burdened Security teams.”
The company addresses a major concern related to third-party supply chain risk which has led to materially adverse impact on thousands of companies over the past decade. One of the largest and least quantified business vulnerabilities lies in website use of client-side JavaScript. Client-side code, delivered in real-time by third-party (as well as fourth and nth party) supply chain partners, helps drive and enhance the website user experience, increase engagement, and drive analytic insights. Typical web properties rely on as many as fifty of these supply chain partners. As this supply chain is composed entirely of unmanaged and unprotected shadow code, website owners are unaware of both the normal and potentially malicious behavior these partners introduce in every web session.
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In a “best-case” scenario, this shadow code introduces the potential for data privacy compliance violations due to unauthorized capture and sharing of data. In the worst-case scenario, it effectively acts as the soft-belly for adversaries on any modern web site. Source Defense prevents more than 9 billion policy and security violations per year for its clients alone. Extrapolating that data to the millions of websites that remain unprotected around the world, the risk is both ubiquitous and staggering in nature. This fertile and extremely profitable threat and attack surface has resulted in hundreds of high-profile incidents and led to thousands of client-side attacks (e.g., eSkimming, credential harvesting, formjacking and Magecart attacks) in the past few years. In fact, research found that more than 10,000 websites were the victim of these attacks in the second half of 2022 alone.
“The team at Source Defense had the foresight to recognize this major gap in website data security and privacy long before the industry did as a whole,” said Yoav Tzruya, General Partner at JVP and Chairman of the Board at Source Defense. “The industry has finally caught up to the reality that the threat of client-side attacks is never going to dissipate, and that the client-side security and data privacy gap must be closed. We’re proud to have Ross rejoin the mission he helped start some years back. Under his leadership and vision, we know that Source Defense will continue to serve and empower their thriving community and further its position as the overall market leader in client-side security.”
The company recognized this emerging issue, established a dominant market position, and continues to grow rapidly as the category leader. A fanatical focus on client satisfaction has led to multi-year engagements and customer retention with many of the world’s largest website owners. Hogan will focus his attention on further strengthening those relationships, driving continued product innovation, and fulfilling the Source Defense corporate mission.
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