Responding rapidly to cyber threats is more important than ever for today’s modern businesses. In 2022, 72% of Australian businesses experienced a cyber incident – much higher than the average 59% across the Australasian region. Ensuring that your organisation can detect and respond to threats before they do serious damage is vital.
Automating threat response enables organisations to respond to threats quickly and efficiently, reducing the time and resources needed to manually detect, analyse, and mitigate threats. It also improves the accuracy of threat detection and response, ensuring that threats are identified and addressed quickly and correctly.
In this article, we will explore how automation can help organisations improve their threat response processes, reduce response time and costs, and ensure that their networks remain secure.
What is threat response?
Threat response is an essential part of any successful security strategy. It ensures that malicious behaviour is detected and dealt with swiftly, and that an organisation’s assets are protected from potential attacks by detecting, investigating, and preventing security threats. The goal of threat response is to identify and mitigate the risks posed by malicious actors, as well as to reduce the impact of any security incidents that may occur.
Threat response typically involves a combination of processes, such as the detection of malicious activity, the analysis of security alerts, and the implementation of measures to mitigate the risks that have been identified.
For example, if a malicious actor attempts to gain access to a system, threat response processes are in place to detect the anomalous activity, analyse the behaviour, generate alerts to the security team, and take the necessary steps to prevent any further damage.
How does automated threat response work?
Automated threat response refers to the use of security tools to automatically detect, analyse, and respond to threats on an organisation’s network. It enables organisations to respond to threats quickly and efficiently, reduce the time and resources needed to manually detect, analyse, and mitigate threats, and improve the accuracy of threat detection and response.
Using automated threat response, automated security tools can detect threats such as network attacks, malware infections, and unauthorised access attempts in real time. They can also analyse these threats to determine their type and scope, and determine the best course of action to take to neutralise the threats. In addition, they can automatically report the threats to security operations teams, so they can respond quickly and effectively to resolve the issues.
The significance of threat detection and response automation
In the modern digital world, threats are becoming increasingly sophisticated and complex. Automation is playing an increasingly important role in threat detection and response, as it helps to identify patterns in vast amounts of data that are too complex for humans to detect.
Automation helps to identify patterns in data faster than humans can, and in many cases, it can detect threats that humans would not be able to spot. It also helps to reduce the risk of human error, as it is not affected by human emotions, biases, or fatigue.
Automation is a critical tool when it comes to improving the cyber risk landscape, and its importance is only going to grow in the future.
Benefits of automating threat response
Increases threat intelligence accuracy
Threat intelligence is information about known threats, their prevalence, and how they operate. It is usually manually collected by security analysts, who research common threats and vulnerabilities, and create reports on them.
Automated threat response improves the accuracy of threat intelligence. It uses threat intelligence to identify threats automatically as soon as they are detected by security tools. This enables security teams to respond to threats as soon as they are detected, reducing the time they remain hidden on the network.
Faster vulnerability discovery
Threat response automation is an effective way to dramatically reduce the time taken to discover vulnerabilities in a system. Automation helps to ensure that no threats or security issues are overlooked, thereby increasing accuracy. By automating the response process, businesses can quickly react to threats, allowing them to be addressed faster and more efficiently.
It also improves the accuracy of the response. Automated systems can be programmed to detect a variety of threats, including those that may not have been previously identified. This can help to ensure that all threats are addressed promptly, and can provide an added layer of security.
Assists IT security teams
Recent research shows Australia’s cyber security profession is critically understaffed, with an estimated 25,000 more IT security workers needed to close the gap. This shortage means that IT teams are already short-staffed and stretched to their capacity, making it difficult for them to manage risk to the best of their abilities.
Automated detection and response software helps address this gap by handling much of the legwork, allowing security professionals to focus their attention on other issues.
Reduced costs and response times
Automated threat response is especially beneficial for businesses with large and complex systems. By quickly detecting and responding to threats, automated systems reduce the need for manual investigation and response.
The fast detection and response of automated systems will reduce the amount of time required for manual investigation and response, allowing businesses to save money and resources that would otherwise be spent on manual investigations.
Reduces risk of human error
In the current day and age, automated threat response is not only beneficial in terms of providing timely and accurate information to the security team, but also helps reduce the risk of human error. This is particularly important as the volume of alerts and threats increases, as it can lead to alert fatigue, where the security team becomes overwhelmed and starts to miss out on important alerts.
Furthermore, automated threat response helps improve the efficiency of the security team. By automating the response to threats, the security team can spend more time focusing on other security tasks, such as patching, compliance and incident response.
Ensures a more consistent threat response
Manual threat response usually relies on a small number of security analysts who have to handle a high number of threats. This can result in inconsistent threat response, with threats being handled differently from analyst to analyst, and no standard procedures being followed.
Automated threat response, on the other hand, enables security teams to respond consistently to threats by using standard procedures programmed into the tools. Automation also enables organisations to respond to threats more consistently, as it enables teams to respond as soon as threats are detected, regardless of their location. This is important in situations where the threat requires an immediate response.
Handles sensitive data carefully
Data security is one of the most important aspects of running a successful business. Handling and storing sensitive data carefully is essential to safeguarding critical information, like user and client data, or financial records.
Automation helps to ensure that user data and client information is stored and handled in a secure and compliant manner while protecting it from unauthorised access. It can be used to monitor this critical data to identify any suspicious patterns or activities, triggering alerts when suspicious activities are detected and allowing businesses to respond quickly and efficiently.
Deploy automated threat response in your business with expert help
By automating threat detection and response, your business can detect potential threats quickly, and take the necessary steps to protect their network and assets.
The cyber security technicians at Steadfast Solutions specialise in deploying, optimising, and managing threat detection and response software. Talk to them today about your business’s needs and find a holistic solution to proactively protect your data, systems, and network.