Threat Detection and Incident Response (TDIR)

Threat detection and incident response refers to identifying and mitigating cyberattacks against an organization. Threat detection involves monitoring the organization’s IT environment for potential indicators of attack and initiating investigations into any identified threats. Incident response involves investigating, containing, remediating, and recovering from an attack.

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How Threat Detection and Incident Response (TDIR) Has Evolved

Cybersecurity is an ongoing cat-and-mouse game between cybercriminals and the organizations that they target. As attackers develop new tools and techniques to attack a company, new defenses are put in place to block them. As new security controls are developed and deployed, cybercriminals look for ways to bypass and overcome them.

This constant cycle has forced continuous changes in the field of TDIR. In general, this evolution is driven by a few factors, including:

Novel Threats: The business of cybercrime is rapidly maturing, and cyberattacks are growing more numerous, sophisticated, and subtle. To identify these attacks, TDIR solutions have matured as well, leveraging deeper visibility and advanced technology.
Expanding Responsibilities: As corporate IT infrastructures grow larger, more complex, and more distributed, traditional cybersecurity tools and processes can’t scale to keep up. As a result, new solutions are needed to provide security operations centers (SOCs) with the visibility and control required to protect the organization.
Technological Innovation: As technology matures, TDIR solutions incorporate new capabilities. For example, the rise of AI has been invaluable for TDIR.

The TDIR Lifecycle

TDIR manages a cybersecurity incident from initial detection through restoring normal operations after the attack has been remediated. The four steps of the TDIR lifecycle include the following:

Detection: Detection is the process of identifying a potential threat to the organization. This typically involves monitoring an organization’s environment for known threats and anomalies that could point to potential intrusions.
Analysis: After identifying a possible attack, it is analyzed to determine whether it is a true threat to the company. In addition to weeding out false positives, this involves assessing the potential severity and impacts of the attack to aid in prioritization of remediation efforts.
Response: Incident response involves mitigating and remediating the identified threat. In addition to containing the attack, this may involve cleaning a system of malware, resetting passwords on compromised accounts, or taking other steps to wipe out the attacker’s presence on the organization’s systems.
Recovery: During a security incident, some systems may be quarantined or taken down by the attack or remediation efforts. Once incident response is complete, recovery involves restoring the organization’s IT infrastructure to normal operations.

TDIR Best Practices

Some best practices for TDIR include:

Preparation: The time to build an incident response team and plan isn’t after a threat has been identified. Defining the team and preparing response strategies in advance reduces the time to recovery and the potential impacts of a cybersecurity incident on the company.
Continuous Monitoring: Cyberattacks can happen at any time, and a company should be prepared to handle them when they occur. Continuous monitoring and analysis reduce the time before a threat is identified and incident response begins.
Automation: Manual processes overload security team members and slow down incident response. Automating common tasks and incident response processes can reduce workloads and the impact of cyberattacks on the business.
Root Cause Analysis: Fixing the symptoms of a cybersecurity incident helps to stop an ongoing attack, but it doesn’t prevent future ones. Performing root cause analysis to determine the underlying security gap that makes an attack possible bolsters the organization’s security posture as well.
Documentation: The incident response team should document the entire process of responding to each security incident. This can help with identifying and correcting inefficiencies or errors and improve the handling of future incidents.

Threat Detection and Incident Response (TDIR) with Check Point Infinity

An effective TDIR program relies on having the right tools and expertise for the job. Without automation and AI-enabled technologies, an organization’s security team cannot rapidly detect and remediate cyberattacks at scale. Effective incident response also requires specialized expertise and knowledge of how to effectively investigate, contain, and eradicate a range of advanced cybersecurity threats.

Check Point provides companies with the tools and support that they need to manage today’s advanced cyber threats. Check Point Infinity SOC uses the latest security technologies to monitor an organization’s IT environments and accurately pick out true threats from the noise of false positives. If your organization is under attack, Check Point Infinity Global Services provides access to on-call incident response experts who can help with remediating the threat and restoring your organization to normal operations.

To learn more about Check Point’s solutions and services and which might be the right fit for your organization, contact a Check Point security expert today.