What is Cynomi and who is it designed for?

Cynomi is an AI-driven platform purpose-built for Managed Service Providers (MSPs), Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs), and virtual Chief Information Security Officers (vCISOs). It enables these service providers to deliver scalable, consistent, and high-impact cybersecurity services without increasing headcount. The platform automates up to 80% of manual processes, embeds CISO-level expertise, and supports over 30 cybersecurity frameworks, making it ideal for organizations seeking efficient risk management, compliance, and cyber resilience.

What core problems does Cynomi solve for MSPs, MSSPs, and vCISOs?

Cynomi addresses key challenges such as time and budget constraints, manual and spreadsheet-based workflows, scalability issues, compliance and reporting complexities, lack of engagement and delivery tools, knowledge gaps among junior team members, and inconsistencies in service delivery. By automating up to 80% of manual processes and embedding expert-level best practices, Cynomi streamlines operations, enhances efficiency, and ensures consistent, high-quality cybersecurity services.

Which industries have benefited from Cynomi according to case studies?

Cynomi has demonstrated measurable impact across several industries, including legal (e.g., a 100-employee legal firm navigating compliance), cybersecurity service providers (CyberSherpas, CA2 Security, Secure Cyber Defense), technology consulting (Arctiq reduced assessment times by 60%), managed service providers (CompassMSP closed deals 5x faster), and the defense sector (CMMC Level 2 onboarding for MSPs).

What are the key features and capabilities of Cynomi?

Cynomi offers AI-driven automation (automating up to 80% of manual processes), centralized multitenant management, compliance readiness across 30+ frameworks (including NIST CSF, ISO/IEC 27001, GDPR, SOC 2, HIPAA), embedded CISO-level expertise, branded exportable reporting, scalability, and a security-first design. The platform also integrates with leading scanners (NESSUS, Qualys, Cavelo, OpenVAS, Microsoft Secure Score), cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP), and supports API-level access for custom workflows.

Does Cynomi support API integrations and third-party scanners?

Yes, Cynomi provides API-level access for extended functionality and custom integrations. It supports integrations with scanners such as NESSUS, Qualys, Cavelo, OpenVAS, and Microsoft Secure Score, as well as native cloud platform integrations (AWS, Azure, GCP). These capabilities enable users to run external/internal scans, upload CSV files, and sync with infrastructure-as-code deployments.

How does Cynomi help with compliance and risk management?

Cynomi automates compliance readiness and risk assessments across 30+ frameworks, including NIST CSF, ISO/IEC 27001, GDPR, SOC 2, and HIPAA. It provides branded, exportable reports, framework-specific mapping documentation, and actionable recommendations. Technical resources such as compliance checklists, risk assessment templates, and incident response plans are available to streamline compliance efforts.

What measurable business outcomes have customers achieved with Cynomi?

Customers have reported significant improvements, including increased revenue, reduced operational costs, and enhanced compliance. For example, CompassMSP closed deals 5x faster, ECI achieved a 30% increase in GRC service margins and cut assessment times by 50%, and Arctiq reduced assessment times by 60%. These outcomes demonstrate Cynomi's ability to accelerate sales cycles, improve efficiency, and deliver measurable ROI.

How do customers rate the ease of use of Cynomi?

Customers consistently praise Cynomi for its intuitive and well-organized interface. James Oliverio, CEO of ideaBOX, stated: 'Assessing a customer’s cyber risk posture is effortless with Cynomi. The platform’s intuitive Canvas and ‘paint-by-numbers’ process make it easy to uncover vulnerabilities and build a clear, actionable plan.' Steve Bowman from Model Technology Solutions noted that ramp-up time for new team members was reduced from four or five months to just one month. Compared to competitors like Apptega and SecureFrame, Cynomi is highlighted as more user-friendly and accessible for non-technical users.

How does Cynomi ensure product security and compliance?

Cynomi prioritizes security over mere compliance by linking assessment results directly to risk reduction. The platform automates up to 80% of manual processes, supports compliance readiness across 30+ frameworks, and provides enhanced reporting to demonstrate progress and compliance gaps. Embedded CISO-level expertise ensures robust protection against threats and enables junior team members to deliver high-quality work.

What technical documentation and resources are available for Cynomi users?

Cynomi provides extensive technical documentation, including compliance checklists (CMMC, PCI DSS, NIST), risk assessment templates, incident response plans, continuous compliance guides, and framework-specific mapping documents. These resources help users understand and implement compliance and risk management processes efficiently.

How does Cynomi compare to competitors like Apptega, ControlMap, Vanta, Secureframe, Drata, and RealCISO?

Cynomi is purpose-built for MSPs, MSSPs, and vCISOs, while many competitors focus on direct-to-business or in-house teams. Cynomi offers AI-driven automation, embedded CISO-level expertise, multitenant management, and supports over 30 frameworks. Compared to Apptega and ControlMap, Cynomi requires less manual setup and expertise. Vanta and Secureframe are strong in select frameworks but less flexible. Drata is premium-priced and has longer onboarding times. RealCISO has limited scope and lacks scanning capabilities. Cynomi stands out for its automation, scalability, and partner-centric approach.

What customer service and support does Cynomi offer after purchase?

Cynomi provides guided onboarding, dedicated account management, comprehensive training resources, and prompt customer support during business hours (Monday through Friday, 9am to 5pm EST, excluding U.S. National Holidays). These services ensure smooth implementation, ongoing optimization, and minimal operational disruptions.

How does Cynomi handle maintenance, upgrades, and troubleshooting?

Cynomi offers a structured onboarding process, dedicated account management for ongoing support, access to training materials, and prompt customer assistance for troubleshooting and resolving issues. This ensures customers can maintain and optimize their use of the platform with minimal downtime.

What lessons can MSPs/MSSPs learn from the 2024 CrowdStrike incident?

The incident highlights the importance of cybersecurity hygiene, including proper management of local admin access and privileges (PAM) and secure storage of backup encryption keys (BitLocker). MSPs/MSSPs should help clients develop robust business continuity plans (BCP), leverage incident response tools, and ensure privileged access management is in place. Downloadable BCP templates and risk assessment samples are available to support these efforts.

How can MSPs/MSSPs help SMB clients recover from large-scale outages like the CrowdStrike incident?

MSPs/MSSPs play a critical role in assisting SMB clients during outages by providing on-site support when remote management tools are offline, guiding clients through recovery steps (e.g., Safe Mode, Windows recovery, BitLocker key retrieval), and helping build long-term business continuity plans. Cynomi offers resources such as BCP templates and risk assessment samples to facilitate these processes.

What the 2024 CrowdStrike Incident Means for MSPs/MSSPs

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CrowdStrike incident and business continuity plan

The CrowdStrike Incident is the most large-scale computing incident to occur in the past 14 years, impacting millions of businesses worldwide. Fixing this issue requires extensive IT efforts, but is also impacted by how each organization practices cybersecurity hygiene. In this article, we explain why MSPs and MSSPs should be involved in fixing efforts and how they can help their SMB clients in the short and long-term.

Why Should CyberSecurity Experts and MSSPs/MSPs Care?

The 2024 CrowdStrike incident resulted from a bug in the release. This seems to be a development/IT issue. Why should professionals engaged in cyber security take notice of this event? There are four main reasons:

First and foremost, the ability to fix the issue partially depends on cyber security hygiene. We provide more details below, but the main idea is that an organization’s cyber security practices directly impacted their ability to bounce back, making security teams and MSPs/MSSPs key players in this incident.
While the CrowdStrike incident is not a cyber security incident, its implications are similar. Security teams can leverage this incident to develop a plan to prevent similar incidents and an incident response tools that deals with them.
The incident compromised the availability of systems and information. Since cybersecurity deals with information confidentiality, integrity and availability, security teams should consider being involved in the fixing process and in the long-term plans to prevent such incidents from recurring in the future.
This bug was part of a security tool release, to a vulnerability scanner, which is part of the security stack and in their realm of responsibility.

Here’s more on why you should care, from William Birchet, founder of the vCISO network and vCISO consultant, and David Primore, CEO and co-founder of Cynomi.

What Happened?

On July 19, CrowdStrike issued a software update to their Falcon Sensor vulnerability scanner. The update was intended to fix a high memory utilization issue. A bug in the release disrupted dozens of millions of Windows users worldwide, showcasing the “blue screen of death”. Systems were forced into a bootloop of constant rebooting..

CrowdStrike issued an updated release to fix the issue. However, since many of the impacted devices were unable to connect to the internet to download the update, they remained stuck in the blue screen of death.

To overcome this, Microsoft has advised customers to reboot in Safe Mode or Windows recovery Mode. Then, admins could go into the Windows System Directory, remove the infected file, reboot and obtain the updated release. However, doing so requires local account access and privileges. Another option enables recovering from WinPE, but this requires BitLocker encryption keys, which are not always available. As of now, there is no other immediate available fix, though Microsoft and CrowdStrike are constantly working on new solutions.

There are millions of impacted businesses. These include airline providers, healthcare services, financial services, emergency call centers, news, SMBs and many more.

The Importance of Cybersecurity Hygiene

Fixing the corrupted CrowdStrike file touches upon two cybersecurity best practices.

Local admin access and privileges – Accessing Windows System Directory and rebooting through Safe Mode requires proper management of local admins and their ability to access sensitive files. This involves PAM – Privileges Access Management. However, many organizations have removed these local accounts, resulting in their inability to reboot in Safe Mode.
Storing backup encryption keys – To recover from WinPE, organizations might need their BitLocker keys. These are often stored in the Domain Controller, but in this case it is also stuck in the blue screen of death. If the organizations didn’t store their backup recovery keys elsewhere, they cannot use this option.

If you are dealing with these issues, continue to follow Microsoft and CrowdStrike updates for more future solutions.

How MSPs/MSSPs can Help Their SMB Clients: Short-Term

Small and medium businesses are exceptionally vulnerable to this incident, since they lack the resources to fix the issue or the pockets to sustain until it is. For security, many of them rely on MSPs and MSSPs. This is an opportunity for these service providers to act as trusted business and security partners and assist their clients until the issue is resolved.

One of the challenges MSPs/MSSPs face is how to access impacted devices. In most cases, you are probably accessing your clients’ networks remotely. However, in such an outage Remote Management tools are also offline. This requires MSPs and MSSPs to come to every site and touch every computer.

How MSPs/MSSPs can Help Their SMB Clients: Long-Term Business Planning

In addition to the immediate fix, this is an opportunity for MSPs/MSSPs to help build and develop their clients’ long-term business continuity plan (BCP).

Don’t start from scratch. Download the BCP template and sample and hit the ground running.

Ensure you execute every step correctly by downloading the XLS risk assessment template.

Why BCP?

Various types of incidents – attacks, outages, wars, natural disasters, and more – can impact industries and businesses around the globe. A business continuity plan ensures that despite such incidents, businesses can continue to operate and deliver goods and services to their clients. A good business continuity plan can be the difference between whether your client’s business survives or not.

A business continuity plan consists of business impact analysis, risk assessment, recovery strategies, actionable plans, roles and responsibilities, incident response, communication plans, employee training, drills, IT disaster recovery, and more.

Cynomi offers a customizable business continuity plan policy, enabling you to develop, plan and track the implementation of the BCP for your clients’ specific needs. With Cynomi, you can scan and understand your clients’ readiness, build detailed policies with actionable tasks, track and measure progress and report the status to your clients’ leadership. To learn more about how to get started, click here.

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