How to gain an unfair advantage over cyberattackers: cybersecurity “Mission control”

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The primary mission of every IT security organization is to mitigate threats and risks. Unfortunately, attackers have an unfair advantage by default. They choose when to attack, can fail as many times as they need to succeed, and only need to fail once to succeed. They can use benign software and tools to hide their intentions and access sophisticated artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) tools to evade detection. And the monetization of cybercrime has led to more frequent sophisticated attacks.

The way to thwart cyber attackers is for every IT security organization to gain an unfair advantage over malicious actors by focusing on what it can control, rather than what it can't. In addition to identifying threats, organizations need to think more holistically about how they can limit their attack surface and streamline their internal security processes to maximize efficiency. The biggest challenge most organizations face is operationalizing security in their environment. Achieving this effectively requires orchestrating and continually adapting people, processes and technology.

Adding more security products does not solve the problem

The focus is on cybersecurity tools. But having too many tools creates complexity and actually creates gaps that increase vulnerability. This is counterproductive for threat mitigation.

Most organizations cannot afford to employ full-time Security Operations Center (SOC) analysts to manage alerts generated by the myriad of products in their environment. As a result, Infosec's day-to-day work becomes an endless struggle to filter and respond to alerts, distracting the team from focusing on implementing security processes, policies, and controls to improve posture and overall security maturity.

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Some organizations turn to outsourcing to manage the alerts their team faces on a daily basis, but most Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs) just capture the alerts and pass them on to the infosec team without adding much value. They become an intermediary between the tools and the infosec team. The onus of investigating the alert, determining if it is a false positive or not, and deciding how best to respond if it is a real incident rests with the team. infosec.

Managed detection and response (MDR) vendors offer more assistance with alert triage and investigation, but most don't take the time to deeply understand their customers' environments. They leverage threat detection technology to identify threats, but due to their lack of understanding of the environment, they are unable to offer advice to their clients on the optimal response to a given incident. . Most MDR vendors also do little to recommend advice on best practices for reducing an organization's attack surface or give advice on how to reduce risk by streamlining internal processes, practices that help improve an organization's security maturity over time.

Take a smart approach to cybersecurity outsourcing

In a study by Dimensional Research, 79% of security professionals said working with multiple vendors presents significant challenges. Sixty-nine percent agree that prioritizing vendor consolidation to reduce the number of tools in their...