Telefónica Tech Acquires iHackLabs to drive training on cybersecurity

Telefónica Tech, through its cybersecurity company ElevenPaths, has announced the acquisition of iHackLabs, a company specialised in cybersecurity training.

In such a fast-changing and dynamic environment as cyber threats, one of the greatest challenges of today's security market is the shortage of talent. Now that all kinds of companies and organisations are undergoing its digital transformation and expanding their exposure to ever more and increasingly sophisticated threats, it is always key to have qualified and trained professionals to deal with them. Studies have highlighted that in the European Union alone there will be over 300,000 vacancies for cybersecurity experts unfilled by the end of 2022.

iHackLabs is a company that identifies, teaches, trains and validates the level of expertise of the next generation of cybersecurity professionals. It has different cloud-based training platforms and labs under a SaaS model that simulate real cyber threat situations adapted to the specific needs of companies and organisations of all kinds in multiple sectors.

It focuses especially on the offensive, defensive and forensic areas of cybersecurity and has, among other resources, platforms for training response teams to tackle incidents (known as Red/Blue teams: ethical hacking teams that simulate cyber-attacks and defend organisations from them). It also has platforms that replicate the full cycle of ransomware and denial-of-service attacks (DoS and DDoS) as well as a pentesting services unit.

With a presence in London and Madrid, iHackLabs collaborates with ElevenPaths since 2018, when it sees the great potential of its technological proposition and advises Wayra, Telefónica's global open innovation hub, on the investment in the company that same year.

"Our relationship with iHackLabs began a few weeks after it arrived in Spain at the beginning of 2018. We are always scouting for collaboration and investment opportunities and the capabilities of the platforms and solutions developed by their team are at the cutting edge of cybersecurity training. It was only a matter of time before we would team up to train our professionals and those of our customers, offering them solutions specifically designed to meet their needs", explains Pedro Pablo Pérez, CEO of ElevenPaths.

"ElevenPaths has a team of highly qualified professionals and it understands that continuous training is necessary to stay ahead of the game and deal with increasingly frequent and diverse cyber threats. In this regard, virtual environments that can simulate real threats are the perfect solution for the comprehensive development of cybersecurity talent. We are especially pleased to be able to offer Telefónica's broad customer base the opportunity to keep driving that talent in their own organisations", points out Miguel Rego, CEO at iHackLabs.

The first to benefit from this acquisition will be ElevenPaths’ security professionals all over the world, a team that will be joined on a gradual basis by the best talent in the sector as the company grows. ElevenPaths will also extend the offer in these training services to its customers both in the private sector and the Public Administration.

The integration of iHackLabs in ElevenPaths follows the recent purchase of Govertis, a company specialising in cybersecurity consulting, as part of Telefónica Tech's growth strategy in the security business in markets in which Telefónica already operates as well as in new ones.