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Are Your Security Operations Up to Snuff?

Are Your Security Operations Up to Snuff?

Are your organization’s systems secure? Are they equipped to prevent security attacks? Detect and eliminate threats quickly? We hate to be alarmist, but research shows there’s a good chance the answer is no.

In a recent report on the state of enterprise security operations, IDC and Splunk reveal some alarming findings on companies’ vulnerability to and preparedness for security attacks:

  • 62 percent of companies are being attacked at least weekly, 20 percent are being attacked daily, and 10 percent are being attacked hourly or more.
  • Only 27 percent of companies say they are equipped to cope comfortably with security incidents.
  • 75 percent say they have no managed incident response plan.
 

The list goes on, but the takeaway is that, while security threats are coming fast and hard, the majority of companies are woefully underprepared. And when a business is unable to prevent security threats — and unable to combat them effectively when they do occur — the consequences can be dire. Customer data is at risk, regulatory compliance may be in jeopardy, and the company’s reputation among customers, investors, and the general public is on the bottom line.

What’s more, IDC and Splunk’s research found that, when companies are dealing with attacks reactively instead of proactively, the human resources cost is high, as well. 83 percent of companies report that dealing with any given incident requires two people or more, and 55 percent report that each incident requires more than two hours to resolve. Consider that the majority of businesses are attacked weekly or more, and the time and manpower add up quickly, equating to at least one full-time employee dedicated solely to incident response for many businesses.

That’s a lot of time and money spent on preventable issues instead of mission critical strategic initiatives.

On the other hand, effective incident response has a powerful positive impact on both the brand reputation and the business’ bottom line. 56 percent of survey respondents indicated that adopting incident response capabilities led to a lower operational cost of security, and half noted that adoption played a significant role in protecting the brand’s reputation:

An incident is the moment of truth for organizations, the point at which they must demonstrate compliant processes in IR, forensics, record keeping, and so on. Regulators do not expect zero breaches. But they do expect organizations to detect breaches early, to be able to determine the impact quickly, and to effect remediation efficiently. The ability to recover from a breach preserves reputation.

Investigation or Exasperation? IDC and Splunk

In short, there’s a significant disconnect between the constant threat of security breaches and most companies’ capacity to handle that threat. So, how can companies streamline security operations to enhance incident response and investigations, and shut down breaches before they happen?

Minimize Risk with Analytics-Driven Security

In the effort to develop the capability for early attack detection, investigation, and response, savvy companies are turning toward analytics-driven security information and event management solutions (SIEMs). There are countless SIEM platforms out there that collect, store, and analyze security-only data, but today’s security threats require a more holistic approach that can correlate security incidents with events across the entire IT environment. Prioritizing security means establishing real-time monitoring to anticipate, protect against, and minimize damage from both external and internal threats.

The right analytics-driven SIEM will have seven key capabilities supercharging your business’s security efforts:

  • Real-time monitoring to identify threats and correlate events across IT systems
  • An organized incident response playbook
  • User monitoring to identify misuse and breaches
  • Threat intelligence to recognize abnormal activity, assess risk, and prioritize response
  • Advanced analytics that use machine learning to turn raw data into actionable insights
  • Advanced threat detection to monitor, analyze, and detect potential threats
  • Use case library to support analysts with relevant content that helps detect and respond to threats faster.

And, even better, the sophistication of the analytics-driven SIEM means most of these processes are automated, minimizing operational costs, manual intervention, and the risk for human error while ensuring effective, proactive security measures.

While there’s little businesses can do to stop cybercriminals from trying, there’s plenty we can do to thwart their efforts, and plenty of reason to take them seriously. A business’s ability to mitigate risks can be the difference between a minor annoyance and a major catastrophe — and it can make or break the business’s reputation among key stakeholders.

At Conducive Consulting, we’ve been working with customers to combat security threats with the advanced analytics and actionable intelligence provided by Splunk Enterprise Security. To learn more about how we can help your organization batten down the hatches with this powerful, analytics-driven SIEM, we invite you to contact us today.

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