Network security that takes itself seriously necessitates not only threat detection but also threat hunting. As a result, it’s more difficult to operate at a high degree of quality with the later method of operation. Cyber threat hunting should be a frequent aspect of any organization’s network protection strategy that prioritises security.
Like many other buzzwords, cyber threat hunting isn’t used consistently, and some firms use it to describe what should be called threat detection and monitoring. Threat hunting is something that some people try very hard to do, but they fail miserably. A combination of technical expertise, threat intelligence expertise, and creative creativity is required to master this art form. A well-trained threat scout is a precious commodity.
If adding threat hunters to a team or training existing staff is not an option, businesses are exploring Threat Hunting-as-A-Service (THaaS) to benefit from services without incurring additional human resource costs. When it comes to hunting, getting started can be one of the most difficult tasks. That’s why working with someone who can provide both manual and semi-automated scanning of systems such as Sangfor can be helpful.
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The Advantages of Threat Hunting
1. Discover Security Incidents Before They Happen
The goal of threat hunting is to find out what threats (such as malware) are hiding in the shadows and, ultimately, find out who is responsible for them. In this approach, attackers who have already managed to penetrate the defences and establish a hostile presence in the network of the organisation can be proactively identified. Hunting is a method of putting an end to the existing assailants.
2. Improve the Response Time of the Threat
According to Crowd Research Partners’ Threat Hunting Report, SOCs are still struggling with threat management. To find dangers that automated systems or standard detection methods might miss, threat hunters utilise a human-driven procedure called “threat hunting” to scour networks for signs of odd behaviour that could be indicative of an impending attack. There may already be an activity or assault pattern existent in an IT system, and ad-hoc hunts can swiftly discover it.
And the better the outcome, the faster active threats are recognised and notified to an incident responder who will “have the expertise and experience to immediately respond to the threat and neutralise it before more damage to the network and data happens.
3. Incorporated into the defences
It’s one of the key benefits of conducting a threat hunting programme because it provides insights into better protecting your organisation from potential dangers.
While conducting threat hunting, the assumption is that a malicious actor has already compromised your systems or networks, therefore the information gained from this process is invaluable for strengthening your organization’s current defences.
4. Time Savings in Research
An added benefit of threat hunting is that it gives a security team a greater knowledge of an incident, including its breadth, causes, and impact.
Investigating after-the-fact incidents can be made easier by taking an active approach, such as scanning computer network traffic for malicious information and enhancing cyberdefenses. This will aid in the extraction of lessons learnt and fixing of potential errors.
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5. Make it easier for cyber security analysts to grasp the business
Additionally, threat hunting is an excellent method for spotting and thwarting potential APTs or other external threats that could compromise an organization’s data security. The current state of the organization’s security and its predicted resilience to a variety of threats are both better understood by IT analysts as a result.
Analysts and incident responders can gain actionable intelligence through threat intelligence, which allows them to anticipate identifying a specific threat in advance. This type of intelligence includes processed contextualised, timely, accurate, relevant, and predictive data.
6. Improved Defense System Aids in Threat Mitigation
As a result, cybersecurity teams are able to protect their environments against advanced threats. As a result of gaining a better understanding of how a danger entered a system, a successful threat-hunting session can help a business strengthen its defences.
7. Forces the company to hire highly qualified specialists
As soon as a firm decides to start using threat hunting in-house, they need to look into hiring experts who have more than just IT expertise. If you want to be a threat hunter, you’ll need to know everything from IR to forensics to network engineering to malware management and reverse engineering.
Many of the talents and know-how that harmful hackers possess will also be required, including creativity and the ability to think critically and solve problems.
It’s common for these experts to have a strong desire to study and stay up to date on the latest cybersecurity developments. They’ll need to be able to convey their results and write excellent technical reports to non-technical management staff. These new additions to the IT team can only be beneficial to a firm.
8. Enhances SOC Performance by Reducing False Positives
One of the best things about hunting is that it’s a human-driven process that can be iterated and analysed as it goes along. When combined with the analysts’ capacity to think outside the box, this combination of tools, repeatable monitoring, and behaviour-pattern searching reduces false positives and time-wasting.
9. Damage and risk are minimised
Once an attacker gains access to a company’s network, the consequences of allowing him or her to remain can be devastating both financially and reputationally. Threat hunting allows firms to discover and eliminate these attackers, avoiding further damage before it occurs.
10. A New Future for SOCs
A security operations centre’s threat hunting platform must include a comprehensive set of useful capabilities (SOCs). Anomalies can be detected with the aid of security information and event management (SIEM) software or an intrusion detection system (IDS), allowing for faster detection of threats and the subsequent implementation of countermeasures. This will help to minimize or prevent further harm.
Even the best platforms have ways to quickly and effectively transform raw data from many sources into useful information. It can even save analysts time by eliminating the need to correlate events manually; it can collect “feeds” from several sources to create actionable intelligence data.
Conclusion
To combat malware and other persistent threats, corporations are turning to the established method of threat hunting, which has gained a lot of traction recently. Analysts are increasingly using threat-hunting systems to discover assaults as evolving and advanced persistent threats (APTs) continue to challenge SOC employees.
There is a rising need to develop security teams who actively “search” for threats to their company because 100% detection is unattainable and conventional security methods and technologies like IDS and SIEM are no longer sufficient.
Using a threat-hunting methodology, cyberthreat intelligence teams are able to target their resources to get the most bang for their buck while identifying potential threats.
Instead of reacting, organizations are now taking a proactive approach, searching for ways to deal with problems faster and more efficiently while also gathering enough data to prevent future problems and create better defences. Stay tuned to TechAdvises for more such cybersecurity informational resources.
