Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Cybersecurity Procurement topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Cowlitz County IT director seeks board approval to buy CrowdStrike endpoint security
Summary
IT Director Travis Foschini asked the county commissioners to approve a purchase of the CrowdStrike endpoint security service, citing prior incident response work and the product's enterprise capabilities; the contract exceeds the $50,000 signature threshold and will be brought to the board for action.
Cowlitz County IT Director Travis Foschini asked the Board of Commissioners on July 1 to approve a purchase of the CrowdStrike endpoint security solution, saying the contract exceeds the county's $50,000 signature threshold and requires board authorization. The request follows a recent incident in which CrowdStrike assisted the county in identifying a threat actor.
Foschini told the commissioners the county has already installed CrowdStrike's agent on devices while responding to the incident and now recommends moving from Malwarebytes to CrowdStrike as the county's primary endpoint detection and response product. "CrowdStrike is a better product. It's an enterprise grade product versus a lightweight EDR for small and medium business," Foschini said.
He said CrowdStrike provides managed services that include monitoring, investigation, threat hunting and remediation tied to the endpoint agent. "This is an enhanced service that we did not have with the former product," Foschini said, adding the vendor helped identify a compromise when the former product could not. Foschini said the county used a competitive purchasing agreement and negotiated reduced pricing and that procurement and legal have reviewed the contract.
Foschini asked the board for approval and signatures so the purchase can proceed; he said the item would be placed on the board agenda the following day. No motion or vote took place during the discussion.
If commissioners approve the purchase at the upcoming meeting, county IT plans to transition fully to CrowdStrike and rely on the vendor's managed services. Foschini said because the agent is already installed countywide, the technical transition should be smoother than switching to a different vendor.
Details the county provided: the contract requires board signature because it exceeds $50,000; the procurement used a competitive purchasing agreement; procurement and legal reviewed the terms. The board did not take formal action during the July 1 session; the item was scheduled to be presented for approval the next day.
