Cybersecurity Services in Chicago
NetSys provides cybersecurity services to businesses in Chicago: 24/7 managed detection and response on every device, identity and email protection across Microsoft 365, vulnerability scanning, staff training and immutable backups, with an engineer acting on alerts rather than forwarding them.
The short answer
NetSys provides cybersecurity to businesses in Chicago: ThreatDown managed detection and response on every device, multifactor authentication and Conditional Access across Microsoft 365, Barracuda email protection, Rapid7 vulnerability scanning, security awareness training and immutable backups with tested restores. Delivery is remote-first from Brooklyn, with the help desk staffed seven days a week from 4 a.m. to 11 p.m. Eastern time (3 a.m. to 10 p.m. Central) and emergency service 24/7. On-site commitments are arranged in advance and sized to the engagement, including a nearby dedicated engineer where regular presence and availability have been confirmed. Ongoing agreements run month to month.
Service information by The NetSys Group. Our editorial standards.
How cybersecurity is delivered in Chicago
Chicago is served from Brooklyn, one hour behind us on Central time. Monitoring runs 24/7 from Brooklyn, and so does emergency service. Our staffed help-desk hours are 4 a.m. to 11 p.m. Eastern time (3 a.m. to 10 p.m. Central), seven days a week. The proposal states severe-incident escalation, authorized remediation and any other after-hours work. On-site commitments outside our on-site coverage (New York City, Long Island, Westchester, the Hudson Valley, North Jersey and Fairfield County, CT) are arranged in advance and sized to the engagement: a mostly remote engagement needs no dedicated on-site engineer, while an engagement that calls for regular presence, such as vCISO work with someone on site two days a week, can include a dedicated engineer with a drive time generally under an hour once availability, location and the visit schedule are confirmed in the proposal. Hardware can ship pre-configured where the project permits remote setup. Confirm landlord access, circuit diversity, cabling and equipment space before approving a network change. Carrier options to check in Chicago include Comcast Business, AT&T Business Fiber and Crown Castle fiber; availability, routing and installation dates must be verified at your address before a failover design is approved.
Who cybersecurity in Chicago is built for
Businesses we can support in and around the Loop, River North, the West Loop, Schaumburg and Naperville include trading and financial firms on Bloomberg Terminal, law firms on iManage, medical practices on Epic, manufacturers on Plex, logistics and freight firms on Descartes, and consulting and professional firms on Deltek. These are examples of business and application needs, not a list of local clients. We coordinate infrastructure, identity and integration with the application vendor, and identify any compliance requirements during discovery. Companies with an internal IT person can agree a split of responsibilities, systems and coverage hours before work begins.
Continuity planning for your Chicago business
Start with the systems your team cannot work without. Record the impact of a building power outage, a failed internet circuit, a compromised account and an unavailable application vendor. Then agree recovery priorities, an independent access path, protected backup copies and a test for each critical workflow. Controls reduce particular risks; they do not guarantee that an incident cannot happen.
Cybersecurity in Chicago: what NetSys delivers
Detection and response
- ThreatDown managed detection and response with EDR agents on every workstation, laptop and server, monitored 24/7
- Microsoft Defender for Business and Rapid7 InsightIDR telemetry from identities, email and endpoints, with a person acting on alerts
- Isolation of a compromised device in real time, with an engineer on the case rather than a ticket in a queue
- Incident investigation and a written timeline for leadership, counsel and your insurer
Identity and email
- Entra ID Conditional Access and multifactor authentication across Microsoft 365, with legacy authentication switched off
- Privileged access and privileged identity management so admin rights are granted just in time and removed afterwards
- Barracuda Email Protection in front of every mailbox, with SPF, DKIM and DMARC enforced
- KnowBe4 security awareness training with simulated phishing built from the lures your industry receives
Exposure and recovery
- Rapid7 InsightVM vulnerability scanning on a schedule, with findings fixed rather than filed
- Cisco Meraki or Fortinet firewall management, segmentation and DNS filtering on office and remote devices
- Immutable backups through Datto SIRIS or Veeam, with restores tested and documented
- The free remote external penetration test, limited to available information and the external scope agreed with you
A 22-person medical practice in Schaumburg
This planning example shows how we could scope the work. It is not a claim about a customer in this market or a measured result. For published customer work, see our case studies.
A 22-seat medical practice in Schaumburg that handles regulated data in Epic across the office and remote staff on home Wi-Fi. The tenant has five permanent Global Administrators and nobody can say why. Email protection is whatever Microsoft ships by default, DMARC was never set up, the Crown Castle fiber firewall is a consumer router, and the last security training anyone remembers was a poster.
- Free remote external penetration test limited to information available to NetSys and the external scope agreed with the business; internal review and remediation scoped separately
- ThreatDown MDR and EDR deployed to every workstation, laptop and server, including the ones partners use from home, with the console monitored 24/7
- Rapid7 InsightVM deployed for scheduled vulnerability scanning, with the first month's findings prioritized and closed
- Cisco Meraki firewall installed with intrusion prevention, geo-blocking, segmentation between finance, servers, printers and guests, and DNS filtering on every device
- KnowBe4 rolled out with a baseline phishing test in week one and training on a recurring schedule, aimed at the lures the industry actually receives
- Rapid7 InsightIDR collecting identity, email, endpoint and firewall logs so an intrusion is visible in one console
Every device is watched by a team that responds, every account sits behind multifactor authentication and Conditional Access, email authentication reduces unauthorized use of the domain and the backups restore. The questionnaire gets answered from documentation. Month to month, like every NetSys agreement.
Firewall, antivirus and maintenance for a five-person office
A five-person office needed the basics done properly rather than an enterprise stack. NetSys replaced the internet provider's router with a business-grade firewall configured with sensible rules, secure remote access and logging, deployed managed antivirus on every machine with updates and alerts handled centrally, and put patching, backup checks and health reviews on a schedule. The agreement covers what the office needs and nothing it does not, month to month. No outcome figures were measured for publication.
Cybersecurity work for other clients
- Law firms
Elder law firm
SharePoint document organization for 28 employees, secure client file sharing, email encryption, and employee access controls.
- Manufacturing
Precision machining company recovering from ransomware
Recovery and restoration of 3 servers and 45 workstations, followed by EDR deployment and immutable backup implementation.
- Insurance
Regional title insurance company
Barracuda email protection for 85 users, phishing simulations, employee security training, and MFA deployment.
Security Awareness & Phishing TrainingIT for Insurance Agencies and Brokers
Client names are withheld. These examples were chosen for the work involved, not for where the client is, so none is presented as a Chicago client.
Compliance in Chicago: Illinois PIPA and what sits on top of it
The Illinois Personal Information Protection Act (815 ILCS 530) sets notice requirements for covered breaches of personal information. In addition to affected residents, certain businesses and state agencies must notify the Illinois Attorney General; the recipients and process depend on the incident and the organization. The service scope should identify the records, access controls, retention settings and incident evidence your business needs; your legal or compliance adviser determines which requirements apply. The security service is built to produce the evidence those rules ask for: multifactor authentication and Conditional Access reports, endpoint detection coverage, vulnerability scan results, backup restore records and a tested incident response plan. Discovery identifies missing records and assigns the documentation work. Applicable duties depend on the business, data, exemptions and contracts; your legal or compliance adviser determines which requirements apply.
Primary sources
What cybersecurity costs in Chicago
Cybersecurity is priced per user per month when it runs as an ongoing service, and per project for an assessment or a remediation. What moves the number: how many devices and identities are in scope, how much incident remediation and recovery is needed beyond the monitoring and authorized MDR actions in scope, which compliance standard the evidence has to satisfy, and whether the Microsoft 365 tenant is already on Business Premium or the security tooling comes from us. The free external penetration test costs nothing and runs remotely before any of that. Our managed IT pricing page explains how the fee is built.
Who this fits, and who it does not
Best fit: businesses with enough people, money movement or regulated data that a breach would hurt, and no security team of their own: professional practices, healthcare groups, importers, financial firms, nonprofits and agencies holding client credentials. Companies with an internal IT person fit as a co-managed arrangement.
Not a fit: organizations that want a security product installed and left alone. The service is monitored, reviewed and reported monthly, and it changes the way administrators, finance staff and vendors work. If that is not wanted, a tool purchase serves better than an engagement.
Read next
Industry pages: IT for Financial Services · IT for Legal
Terms used on this page: Managed Detection and Response (MDR) · Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) · Conditional Access
Guides: MDR versus antivirus for a small business · the Conditional Access policies to turn on first
Related pages
Read the full Cyber Security service page. See all locations and service areas.
Also in Chicago: Managed IT Services · IT Consulting · IT Support
Cybersecurity elsewhere: New York City · Brooklyn, NY · Nassau County, NY · Suffolk County, NY · Westchester County, NY · Stamford, CT
Related services: Penetration Testing · Cyber Insurance Readiness · Security Assessments · Managed Detection & Response (MDR)
Cybersecurity in Chicago: FAQs
What does the free external penetration test include?
The free offer is a remote external penetration test, limited to the information available to NetSys and the external scope agreed with you. It examines what your business shows the internet and reports the findings with their scope and limitations stated. Reviews of tenant settings, devices, internal networks or backups need a separate scope.
Will cybersecurity services help us pass a cyber insurance questionnaire?
Yes. Multifactor authentication, endpoint detection and response, tested offline backups and security awareness training are the four controls almost every questionnaire asks about, and the service produces the evidence for each. Our cyber insurance readiness page lists what carriers are asking for in 2026.
What happens if we are breached?
The MDR team isolates the affected device, an engineer investigates and a written timeline goes to leadership, your counsel and your insurer. The incident response plan we write during onboarding names who does what, so the first hour is not spent deciding.
Do you have an office in Chicago?
Our office is in Brooklyn, NY. Chicago is served from Brooklyn, one hour behind us on Central time. Outside our on-site coverage the on-site arrangement is agreed before the engagement starts and sized to what it needs: none for a mostly remote account, or a dedicated engineer where regular presence such as vCISO work with someone on site two days a week is part of the scope. A drive time generally under an hour is an option subject to confirming engineer availability and your address. The help desk is staffed seven days a week from 4 a.m. to 11 p.m. Eastern time (3 a.m. to 10 p.m. Central), with emergency service 24/7. The proposal states the on-site arrangement and any travel in writing, and the agreement runs month to month.
How can IT support help with Illinois data-security requirements?
The Illinois Personal Information Protection Act (815 ILCS 530) sets notice requirements for covered breaches of personal information. In addition to affected residents, certain businesses and state agencies must notify the Illinois Attorney General; the recipients and process depend on the incident and the organization. NetSys can help document the relevant systems, controls and incident evidence within an agreed scope; legal notification decisions remain with your authorized business and legal team.
See what an attacker sees before they do.
The free assessment is a remote external penetration test, limited to the information available to NetSys and the external scope we agree with you. Internal reviews and ongoing security management are scoped separately.