Tenable Acquiring Attack Surface Platform Bit Discovery

COLUMBIA, Md. — The cyber risk company Tenable is acquiring the attack surface company Bit Discovery. 

Tenable (Nasdaq: TENB) signed an agreement to acquire Santa Clara, California, based-Bit Discovery, a specialist in external attack surface management (EASM) software, according to Tenable last month. 

Tenable will acquire Bit Discovery for $44.5 million in cash, subject to customary purchase price adjustments. 

The acquisition is expected to close in the second quarter of 2022, subject to the satisfaction of customary closing conditions.

Bit Discovery, founded in 2018, has roughly nine employees, according to LinkedIn.

The combination of Tenable’s cyber exposure solutions with Bit Discovery’s EASM capabilities is intended to give customers a 360-degree view of the attack surface to identify and eliminate areas of known and unknown security risk.

Tenable believes attack surface discovery has “never been more critical,” given the reliance on critical internet-facing services, applications, and APIs. 

Most organizations are “largely blind to the full and ever-changing scope” of internet-facing assets and services, according to Tenable.

Bit Discovery is designed to help customers continuously monitor the internet, allowing them to discover and identify externally facing assets that could become exploitable targets by cyber criminals.

After closing, Tenable will incorporate Bit Discovery’s EASM solutions across its entire portfolio, from enterprise vulnerability management (VM) to Nessus and cloud to operational technology (OT) to identity. 

By covering both external and internal assets, Tenable plans to provide a comprehensive view of vulnerabilities and cyber risk, helping customers prioritize remediation and minimize cyber exposure.

Bit Discovery was founded by Jeremiah Grossman and Robert Hansen. 

Grossman, who also founded WhiteHat Security, has spent about 20 years in information security.

Hansen previously worked in cybersecurity at eBay, where he was responsible for authentication as well as anti-fraud and anti-phishing technologies.

“Whatever is visible on the internet is very likely to be the first target and the hardest thing for organizations to continuously see and assess,” said Glen Pendley, chief technology officer, Tenable. 

“We believe attack surface management is vital to modern cybersecurity and an integral part of our vulnerability and cyber exposure solutions. We are seamlessly combining previously disjointed insights and empowering security practitioners to eliminate blind spots and easily understand their cyber exposure in ways previously not possible.”

Joining Tenable will give Bit Discovery the ability to “instantly reach 40,000 global customers, accelerating our vision in ways that would have otherwise been impossible,” said Jeremiah Grossman, CEO and co-founder, Bit Discovery. 

“This capability combined with the insights provided by Tenable’s solutions is a compelling chance to change the market,” Grossman said.