Security consultancy Lares expands into Canada

Lares, a Denver-based security consulting firm, has expanded into Canada with a new Toronto location.

Founded in 2008, Lares helps organizations secure electronic, physical, intellectual, and financial assets through assessment, testing, and coaching services. The company’s offerings include penetration testing, application security, incident response, social engineering, and physical security, among others. Lares has offices in Denver and Atlanta.

The firm will now add its first international location in Toronto through the launch of subsidiary Lares Canada. The new office will provide a local presence for the company’s existing Canadian clients in financial services, oil and gas, technology, and government. The office will also spearhead the company’s cybersecurity offering to the rest of the country.

"Lares has been increasingly working with Canadian companies and Canadian subsidiaries or branches of international companies over the past few years," said Chris Nickerson, founder & CEO of Lares. "With the opening of our Toronto office, Lares will bring its security assessment, compliance, and management expertise to Government and private industry."

The consultancy also announced that it had hired Lee Kagan as director of adversarial collaboration, based in Toronto. Kagan was previously a senior principal offensive R&D specialist at Symantec, which recently sold its cybersecurity services unit to Accenture.

Before that, Kagan co-founded RedBlack Cyber Security, a Toronto-based offensive security unit specializing in threat emulation, penetration testing, and scenario-driven exercises. He also worked in penetration testing and attack strategy at Bottl Security Team and CanSecTek.

"I could not be more thrilled to join the already incredible team at Lares," Kagan said. "For as long as I can remember, they've been producing exceptional work, talent and have a unique ability to cut through the noise and get the job done all the while operating at the highest possible level you want from a security testing shop."