BFSI · East Africa

I&M Bank builds an analytics-driven SOC on Splunk.

A 24/7 Splunk SOC delivers centralized visibility and far fewer false positives.

// Client overview

I&M Group is a leading corporate group in East Africa with a major presence across banking, insurance and real estate, present in Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Mauritius and Uganda. I&M Bank operates as four independent units - I&M Bank Limited, I&M Bank Tanzania, I&M Bank Rwanda and I&M Bank Uganda - across East Africa.

As cybersecurity threats grew more sophisticated, I&M Bank's units across Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda and Uganda needed to protect customers' sensitive data and ensure uninterrupted operations. Regional operations presented distinct challenges with complex IT infrastructures and different regulations.

Sector

BFSI

Region

East Africa

Engagement

Cyber transformation

Services

Managed SOC (24/7x365) · SIEM engineering · Threat hunting · Fraud detection · Compliance reporting

Technologies

Splunk (SIEM + infrastructure monitoring) · Advanced correlation algorithms · AI/ML-based SOC

// Key challenges

Limited visibility: a lack of centralized visibility across on-prem and cloud environments at each unit obstructed timely detection and response.

DDoS attacks: a surge in cyber threats, mainly DDoS, put the availability of the banks' digital channels at risk.

Alert fatigue: the existing infrastructure generated a high volume of alerts, causing the lean security team to miss real threats or respond late.

Real-time monitoring, proactive threat hunting, endpoint detection and response, forensic root-cause analysis, fraud detection, alert triage and compliance reporting were all required.

// The solution · highlights

Inspira reviewed I&M Bank's security architecture across the four locations, derived the SOW, PQ and TQ, and designed a highly reliable SOC on the Splunk platform for 24/7x365 monitoring.

Real-time monitoring and alerting: Splunk infrastructure monitoring across on-prem and cloud, with SIEM continuously monitoring logs, network traffic and security events to surface patterns and anomalies.

Centralized visibility: Splunk provided a single-pane view of all security events, enabling analysts to respond proactively.

Elimination of false alerts: Inspira developed advanced algorithms that filtered false alerts by correlating incidents with historical data, letting analysts focus on real threats.

Incident management: analysts performed investigations, root-cause identification and detailed forensic analysis, reducing investigation turnaround.

Compliance reporting: comprehensive reports on incidents, investigations and remediation demonstrated adherence to regulatory standards.

// Outcome & benefits

24x7x365 monitoring enabled round-the-clock detection and proactive response, protecting customer data and assets.

Enhanced security posture with real-time visibility, improved fraud detection and security analytics across many data sources and use cases.

Improved incident response: false alerts were drastically reduced and meaningful alerts sped up remediation with automation.

A scalable, future-ready SOC architecture able to adapt to growth and emerging threats.

“We deeply appreciate the outstanding cybersecurity services provided to our bank across Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda and Uganda by the Inspira team. The centralized visibility and threat-monitoring capabilities have been instrumental in protecting our financial systems and customer data.”
Nelson Nasongo, Group Chief Information Security Officer, I&M Bank Group

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