One of the most significant challenges that organisations face today is how to stay secure in an increasingly connected world. Staying ahead of cyberattacks is a constant battle and the cost of protecting against cyberthreats is escalating.
Businesses are now investing in dedicated security teams to help them meet their needs, including risk management, compliance, audit, and governance to improve their security posture.
This guide covers what SOC, SecOps, and SIEM can do for your business and how you can leverage the experience and knowledge of a dedicated security service provider to protect your enterprise data and systems.
What is SOC?
A security operations centre (SOC) is a centralised facility where a team of IT security experts work to protect an organisation’s IT environment, by monitoring, detecting, analysing, and investigating security threats.
Devices, networks, operating systems, servers, databases, and applications are continuously monitored to mitigate security risks and watch for signs of a cybersecurity incident. The SOC team analyses data, enhances responses, and watches for new vulnerabilities.
What is SecOps?
Security operations, or SecOps, is the partnership between IT operations and IT security, which unifies tools, processes, and technology to keep organisations secure while mitigating security risk.
In the past, the goals of both security and operation teams conflicted. Operations would set up systems to achieve performance and uptime goals, while security was responsible for confirming compliance and regulatory requirements, putting defense practices in place, and removing security vulnerabilities. Security was seen as slowing down operations, rather than being part of the fundamental requirements of IT systems.
Combining security and operations allows security to be considered from the beginning, when solutions are sought and systems are being designed. Rather than the system being set up and then adding security later, it is done from the start with security always in mind. This allows companies to meet security goals much more efficiently.
What is SIEM?
SIEM stands for security information and event management and provides organisations with advanced threat detection, analytics and response.
SIEM combines security information management (SIM) and security event management (SEM) to provide real-time analysis of security alerts that are generated from log and event data from across an organisation’s applications, security tools, and host systems.
This data is brought together into a single, centralised platform, where correlation and statistical models can identify potential threats, alert SOC, and provide information to investigate them. SIEM provides organisations with the ability to detect security threats faster, which results in less time from detection to containment and eradication.
How do SOC, SecOps and SIEM work together?
Cybersecurity teams are responsible for safeguarding critical data from threats, every minute of every day. As cybercrime increases and malicious attackers utilise more advanced tactics such as automation, the threat becomes more real, especially as your company’s data collection and storage needs increase. Keeping this vital information protected requires preparation and protection in real-time.
SecOps teams are highly skilled experts and to keep security at the highest level, teams need to work in shifts 24/7 to log activity and reduce risks. However, the cost of setting up a SOC is a significant financial investment and can be a major obstacle in the way of proactively increasing security posture for many companies.
Fortunately, with cutting-edge cloud-based SIEM technology such as Microsoft Sentinel, and managed security service providers, enterprises can leverage the benefits of a SOC without the need for a dedicated facility and inhouse team. SIEM allows detection and prevention of threats quickly and effectively, and can be a cost-effective solution for enterprises without the burden of hiring additional inhouse resources and staff. For enterprises with compliance and regulatory requirements for security, SIEM software can be customised to ensure compliance requirements are met with ease.
Cybersecurity has never been more important and you can’t afford to be complacent. Speak to the cybersecurity specialists at INTELLIWORX about tailored security solutions for your business.
