What cybersecurity consulting does DESSS provide in El Paso?
DESSS delivers cybersecurity assessment, implementation, and managed support to El Paso organizations across fifteen disciplines: Active Directory, Microsoft Entra, Defender and Sentinel, Intune and Purview; identity and privileged access; SOC and MDR; vulnerability assessment, penetration testing, and red teaming; cloud security; Zero Trust networking; endpoint and email security; backup and data resilience; GRC; application and API security; and OT, ICS, and IoT security for plants and warehouses.
Work can stop at a written assessment, continue into a remediation project, or move into managed support, with one team accountable throughout.
EL PASO
Securing the Systems Behind a Border Economy
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El Paso and Ciudad Juárez function as one industrial region split by an international boundary. Maquiladora plants on the Mexican side depend on El Paso warehouses, customs brokers, trucking companies and engineering offices on the Texas side, and every shipment moves with a stream of EDI messages, portal logins, shared spreadsheets and email approvals. That chain of trading partners is exactly what modern attackers exploit: a single compromised broker mailbox or supplier VPN can redirect a payment, delay a crossing or open a route into a plant network.
DESSS is a Texas technology consulting firm headquartered in Houston, with a second office in Austin, and we serve El Paso organizations through remote assessments, planned working sessions and managed services. Our security consultants work alongside cloud, Microsoft and integration engineers, which matters here because the weak spot is usually a connection between systems, such as an ERP feeding a carrier portal, rather than a single server.
Most engagements start with a scoped review of identities, partner connections and the boundary between office IT and production equipment. If you need longer-term strategic guidance, the DESSS security advisory practice explains our advisory and virtual CISO model; this page focuses on the hands-on technical services that follow.
Where work usually starts
Trading-partner and EDI connection reviews, email fraud prevention, plant network segmentation and Microsoft 365 identity hardening.
What we protect
ERP and warehouse systems, EDI and SFTP gateways, carrier and broker portals, Windows fleets, Azure and AWS workloads, and production networks.
Frameworks we align to
NIST CSF, CIS Controls, ISA/IEC 62443, CMMC and NIST SP 800-171, HIPAA and PCI DSS, plus customer and CTPAT security expectations.
How DESSS works with El Paso
A Texas firm headquartered in Houston at 2825 Wilcrest Dr, with an Austin office, supporting El Paso clients remotely and through managed services.
LOCAL RISK PICTURE
Why El Paso Businesses Need Cybersecurity Consulting
Threat actors follow money and leverage. In El Paso both sit in the flow of goods between two countries, the plants that produce them, and the hospitals and federal programs that serve the region.
Partner connections multiply risk
Shippers, brokers, carriers, warehouses and plants exchange orders, invoices and customs documents through EDI, portals and email. Every integration and shared credential is a doorway that needs ownership and monitoring.
Payment redirection is common
Business email compromise thrives where invoices cross companies and languages. A spoofed message asking to change bank details can divert a freight or supplier payment before anyone notices.
Plant floors are now connected
Production lines, test benches and warehouse automation report to MES, ERP and cloud dashboards. Without segmentation, malware on an office PC can halt a line or a distribution center.
Downtime stops trucks at the bridge
Customs filings, dispatch and yard systems run on tight schedules. A ransomware outage at a broker or carrier backs up shipments for customers on both sides of the border.
Defense work brings CMMC
Contractors supporting Fort Bliss and other Department of Defense programs must protect Controlled Unclassified Information and demonstrate NIST SP 800-171 controls to win and keep contracts.
Customers audit their suppliers
Manufacturers, retailers and CBP partnership programs increasingly ask suppliers for security questionnaires, MFA, endpoint protection and incident plans. Weak answers can cost a contract.
PLATFORMS AND SERVICES
Cybersecurity Platforms & Services for El Paso Companies
Our practice is built on five Microsoft security platforms and ten security domains. Each card leads to a full service page describing scope, deliverables and how an engagement is structured.
Microsoft Active Directory
AD DS design, hardening, migration, and forest recovery for the on-premises identity core.
Microsoft Entra
Entra ID, Conditional Access, PIM, and identity governance for cloud identity and Zero Trust.
Microsoft Defender
Defender XDR and Microsoft Sentinel SIEM deployed, tuned, and run as a working detection capability.
Microsoft Intune
Intune security baselines, Autopilot provisioning, and co-management for compliant devices.
Microsoft Purview
Information protection, DLP, records management, and eDiscovery across Microsoft 365.
Cloud Security
Posture management, cloud entitlements, workload and container security, IaC guardrails.
MICROSOFT SECURITY
Microsoft Security Solutions for El Paso Businesses
What is the Microsoft security stack? It is a connected toolset: Active Directory and Microsoft Entra govern who signs in, Microsoft Defender and Sentinel detect and investigate threats, Microsoft Intune keeps devices compliant, and Microsoft Purview classifies and protects information. Most Microsoft 365 business and enterprise plans include parts of it that sit unused.
Cross-border operations tend to accumulate identities: plant engineers, broker staff, drivers with shared tablets, and partner users invited as guests into Teams and SharePoint. We bring that sprawl under control first, using Entra ID governance, guest access reviews and Conditional Access rules that treat a warehouse kiosk differently from an executive laptop.
Once identity is clean, we connect Defender signals to a monitored SIEM, enroll devices in Intune, and use Purview to label commercial documents such as pricing, bills of materials and customs paperwork. Where plants run equipment that cannot host Microsoft agents, we define where OT monitoring takes over.
Microsoft Active Directory
Cleanup of legacy trusts, shared service accounts and plant-floor domain joins that expose the corporate directory to production networks.
AD DS design, hardening, migration, and forest recovery for the on-premises identity core.
Microsoft Entra
Guest and B2B access reviews for trading partners, plus Conditional Access for shared warehouse tablets and cross-border travelers.
Entra ID, Conditional Access, PIM, and identity governance for cloud identity and Zero Trust.
Microsoft Defender
Defender XDR and Sentinel tuned for business email compromise, suspicious inbox rules and unusual partner sign-ins.
Defender XDR and Microsoft Sentinel SIEM deployed, tuned, and run as a working detection capability.
Microsoft Intune
Enrollment and compliance baselines for rugged scanners, dispatch tablets and laptops used by staff who cross the border daily.
Intune security baselines, Autopilot provisioning, and co-management for compliant devices.
Microsoft Purview
Labels and DLP for bills of materials, rate sheets, customs records and patient information shared with outside parties.
Information protection, DLP, records management, and eDiscovery across Microsoft 365.
IDENTITY, DETECTION AND TESTING
Identity, Detection and Testing Consulting in El Paso
These services control who reaches your systems and partner connections, catch intrusions early, and prove whether your defenses survive a real attack attempt.
IAM & PAM
What are IAM and PAM? IAM is how an organization decides and enforces who may sign in to which systems, through directories, single sign-on, multi-factor authentication and role-based permissions. PAM focuses on the powerful accounts, such as domain, ERP and firewall administrators, adding vaulted credentials, approvals and recorded sessions.
El Paso operations often share logins across shifts, plants and partner companies, and former employees of a broker or contractor keep access far too long. We replace shared accounts with named identities, set up access certification for partner and guest users, and put just-in-time elevation in front of ERP, EDI gateway and plant domain administration.
–Named identities in place of shared logins
–Partner and guest access certification
–Just-in-time privileged elevation
SOC & MDR
What are SOC and MDR? A SOC is a function, staffed by analysts and supported by a SIEM, that monitors security telemetry, investigates alerts and leads containment. MDR delivers that function as a managed service, adding proactive threat hunting and guided response for organizations without a full in-house team.
For a logistics firm the critical signals are mailbox rule changes, unusual partner sign-ins and file transfers outside normal patterns; for a manufacturer they include traffic crossing into the plant network. We tune detections for those scenarios, add threat hunting for slow-moving intrusions, and run or co-manage monitoring with your staff, supported by an incident response retainer.
–Detection use cases for fraud and partner access
–SIEM onboarding and alert tuning
–Run or co-managed monitoring and hunting
VAPT, penetration testing & red team
What is VAPT? VAPT is a two-part security test. Vulnerability assessment scans systems for known flaws and misconfigurations; penetration testing has a skilled tester exploit and chain those flaws to show what an attacker could actually reach. Red teaming adds stealth and objectives to test detection and response.
Typical El Paso scopes include carrier and customer portals, SFTP and EDI endpoints exposed to trading partners, remote access gateways used by plant vendors, and the path from a warehouse workstation to the domain. We schedule testing around shipping peaks and production windows and report findings with clear reproduction and retest steps.
–Partner-facing portal and API testing
–Internal network and Active Directory testing
–Red and purple team engagements
Cloud security consulting
What is cloud security? Cloud security is the practice of configuring and monitoring Azure, AWS and SaaS environments so identities, storage, networks and workloads are not exposed. It includes landing zone design, permission management, posture monitoring and container and infrastructure-as-code controls.
Freight visibility platforms, supplier portals and analytics for plant output often run in Azure or AWS, built quickly to meet a customer deadline. We review those environments for exposed storage, over-broad API keys and missing logging, apply cloud security posture management, and secure integration points where cloud apps talk to on-premises ERP systems.
–Azure and AWS posture assessment
–Integration and API key exposure review
–Ongoing configuration drift monitoring
Zero Trust and network security
What is Zero Trust security? Zero Trust means granting access one request at a time based on verified identity, device condition and context, rather than trusting a user because they are connected to the office network or a VPN. Each person or system reaches only the resources it needs.
In El Paso this usually starts with network segmentation between office, warehouse, guest and production networks, then VPN modernization for vendors and staff who connect from plants, trucks and home. Partner connections move from broad tunnels to application-specific access, so a breach at one trading partner cannot spread into yours.
–Office, warehouse and plant network separation
–Application-level access for partners
–Remote access and firewall modernization
PROTECTION, GOVERNANCE AND OPERATIONS
Endpoint, Data, Compliance and Plant Security in El Paso
These services harden the devices and records your operations rely on, demonstrate compliance to customers and assessors, and extend protection to production lines and warehouse automation.
Endpoint and email security
What is endpoint security? Endpoint security keeps computers, servers, scanners and phones protected through EDR or XDR monitoring, hardened configurations and consistent patching. Email security is its partner control, stopping the phishing, spoofing and payment-change requests that start most incidents.
Dispatch desks, shipping offices and plant supervisors handle a constant flow of invoices and partner email, which makes them prime targets. We roll out EDR, enforce patch and vulnerability management, lock down rugged handhelds with mobile device and BYOD security policies, and configure email security and anti-phishing controls including DMARC to stop impersonation of your brand and your suppliers.
–EDR deployment across offices and sites
–Patch cadence and device baselines
–DMARC and payment-fraud email controls
Data protection and cyber resilience
What is data protection? Data protection keeps business information confidential and recoverable. Core elements are classification, data loss prevention, encryption, database hardening and an immutable backup design that ransomware cannot encrypt or erase, backed by tested recovery procedures.
If a customs, transportation management or MES database goes down, trucks and lines stop. We build immutable backup copies of those systems, set recovery priorities with operations leaders, rehearse restores, and protect sensitive files such as engineering drawings, pricing and patient records with encryption and access controls.
–Immutable and isolated backup copies
–Recovery runbooks and restore tests
–Encryption and data loss prevention
GRC and compliance
What is GRC in cybersecurity? GRC brings structure to security: governance assigns ownership and policy, risk management identifies and ranks threats to the business, and compliance demonstrates to customers, regulators and assessors that required controls are in place. A virtual CISO often leads it.
El Paso companies answer to customer supplier audits, CMMC for defense work, HIPAA for providers and PCI DSS where cards are taken. We run third-party and vendor risk management across your carriers, brokers and software providers, build policies that cover cross-border operations, and give leadership a risk register in plain business terms.
–Supplier and partner risk program
–CMMC, HIPAA and PCI DSS readiness
–Risk register and vCISO reporting
Application security and DevSecOps
What is application security? Application security reduces vulnerabilities in the software an organization builds or customizes. It combines threat modeling, secure code review, automated SAST and DAST, dependency and secrets scanning, and pipeline controls so flaws are caught before release.
Development groups in the region build shipment tracking pages, EDI translators, supplier onboarding forms and integrations between ERP, WMS and carrier systems. We review that code, add scanning to the build pipeline, and perform API security testing to make sure one customer cannot read another customer's shipments or rates.
–Secure code and integration review
–Pipeline scanning and secrets control
–API authorization and rate-limit testing
OT, ICS and IoT security
What is OT security? OT security protects the systems that run physical work, such as PLCs, HMIs, robotics, conveyors and connected sensors. Because uptime and safety come first, it relies on passive monitoring, careful segmentation and tightly controlled vendor access.
Manufacturers supplying or operating maquiladora lines, and distribution centers with automated sortation, increasingly link equipment to MES and cloud reporting. We start with an OT security assessment and asset inventory, design zones and conduits under ISA/IEC 62443, add ICS and SCADA monitoring, and give machine builders secure remote access for vendors in place of always-on modems.
–Plant asset inventory and risk review
–Zones, conduits and segmentation design
–Controlled vendor remote access
INDUSTRIES
Industries We Support in El Paso
Security needs follow the business model. These are the sectors where DESSS most often works with El Paso organizations and the problems each one brings.
Logistics, brokerage and warehousing
Customs brokers, freight forwarders, 3PLs and cross-dock operators: EDI and portal security, business email compromise defense and recovery planning for time-critical systems.
Manufacturing and maquiladora supply chains
Plants and their El Paso support offices: IT and OT separation, engineering data protection, vendor remote access and evidence for customer supplier audits.
Transportation and trucking
Carriers and fleet operators: dispatch and telematics system protection, mobile device control for drivers and identity hardening for shared terminals.
Healthcare
Hospitals, clinic networks and specialty practices: HIPAA risk analysis, ransomware resilience, medical device segmentation and patient data protection.
Government and defense contractors
Suppliers supporting Fort Bliss and federal programs, plus public agencies: CMMC and NIST SP 800-171 readiness, CUI handling and Microsoft 365 hardening.
Professional and trade services
Accounting, legal, engineering and trade-consulting firms serving cross-border clients: client data protection, secure file exchange and phishing defense.
ASSESSMENT PROCESS
How a Cybersecurity Assessment Works for El Paso Businesses
A cybersecurity assessment measures how well your current controls protect the operations that matter and produces a prioritized plan to close the gaps. DESSS runs it in five stages.
STEP 01
Agree on what cannot stop
We identify the processes that must keep running, such as customs filing, dispatch, a production line or patient care, and the systems and partners involved.
STEP 02
Trace connections and assets
We inventory users, devices, cloud tenants and every inbound and outbound partner connection, including EDI, SFTP, VPNs and portal integrations.
STEP 03
Test what is exposed
Configuration reviews, vulnerability scanning and, where approved, penetration tests show which weaknesses an attacker could actually use.
STEP 04
Prioritize against business impact
Findings are mapped to NIST CSF and any customer or contract requirements, then ranked by how much disruption or loss each could cause.
STEP 05
Build and execute the roadmap
We produce a phased remediation plan with owners and effort, and DESSS can implement it alongside your team and retest the key fixes.
WHY DESSS
Why El Paso Companies Work with DESSS
DESSS is a Texas technology consulting firm headquartered in Houston, with an office in Austin, and its cybersecurity practice supports El Paso clients. These are the reasons organizations bring us in.
Integration-aware security
We understand how ERP, WMS, EDI and carrier systems connect, so controls protect partner data flows without breaking the integrations your shipments depend on.
IT and OT in one plan
Office networks, warehouse automation and production equipment are assessed together, with changes scheduled around production and shipping windows.
From finding to fix
The same team that assesses also implements identity, cloud, endpoint and network changes, so the roadmap gets executed rather than shelved.
Evidence your customers accept
Deliverables are written for auditors and customer questionnaires: risk registers, policies, network designs and test results you can share.
Flexible engagement options
Assessment, implementation, integration and migration, managed support, or training and change management, matched to your size and timeline.
DESSS provides El Paso organizations with cybersecurity assessments, remediation and managed support covering Microsoft security, identity and privileged access, SOC and MDR, penetration testing, cloud and Zero Trust network security, endpoint and email security, data resilience, GRC, application and API security, and OT and IoT security.
A consultant pinpoints the weaknesses most likely to disrupt your operations and leads the work to fix them. For El Paso businesses that often means securing trading-partner connections, stopping invoice fraud, separating plant networks from office IT and answering customer security audits.
Yes. DESSS reviews Azure and AWS environments for exposed storage, excessive permissions, weak key handling and missing logging, secures integrations with on-premises systems, and sets up continuous posture monitoring to catch drift.
Yes. DESSS tests partner-facing portals, APIs, SFTP and remote access gateways, internal networks and Active Directory, and can run red and purple team exercises. Testing windows are planned around shipping peaks and production schedules.
Zero Trust is a security approach that requires every user and device to prove who they are and that they are healthy before reaching any resource. Access is narrow, networks are segmented, and nothing is trusted simply because it is inside the corporate network.
DESSS works with Active Directory, Microsoft Entra ID, Microsoft Defender XDR, Microsoft Sentinel, Microsoft Intune and Microsoft Purview, plus Azure and AWS security services. Identity engagements can include CyberArk, SailPoint, Okta and Ping Identity where they are already in place.
It begins by identifying the processes that must not stop, then inventories assets and partner connections, tests exposed weaknesses, ranks findings by business impact against frameworks such as NIST CSF, and ends with a phased remediation roadmap that DESSS can help execute.
Logistics and customs brokerage, manufacturing and maquiladora supply chains, transportation, healthcare, government and defense contractors, and professional services see the most benefit. Each faces different pressures, from payment fraud to plant downtime and CMMC requirements.
DESSS combines assessment and hands-on delivery, understands how ERP, EDI and plant systems interconnect, and leaves written deliverables suited to customer audits. It is a Texas firm headquartered in Houston with an Austin office, offering engagements from a single assessment to managed support.
Start with an inventory of every partner connection and the credentials behind it. Then retire shared accounts, enforce MFA on portals, restrict SFTP and VPN access to specific systems, monitor transfers for anomalies, and include partners in third-party risk reviews.
Yes. DESSS defines where Controlled Unclassified Information lives, assesses controls against NIST SP 800-171, drafts the system security plan and plan of action, implements missing technical controls and organizes evidence before a CMMC assessment.
START HERE
Book an El Paso Cybersecurity Assessment
Tell us which operation you can least afford to lose, a border crossing schedule, a production line, a hospital system or a defense contract, and DESSS will scope an assessment around protecting it.
RELATED
Related Cybersecurity Pages
The main DESSS cybersecurity page, cybersecurity consulting in other locations, and related reading.
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