We have previously touched upon why organisations should invest in a Security Operations Center (SOC), outlining its many benefits, including the improved coordination, organisation and analysis that can take place, resulting in enhanced, bespoke decision-making and swifter actions, both proactively as well as after the detection of a threat.
However, the design and implementation of a SOC does not necessarily have to be an internal, on-site feature of an organisation’s information technology and cybersecurity infrastructure. The creation of a SOC, as well as its day-to-day operation and maintenance can also be outsourced to an external company. This course of action has several advantages which we will list below.
Cost, Experience and Expertise
The primary benefit to outsourcing your SOC is directly linked to two factors: the cost of creating and maintaining a SOC, and the acquisition of the prerequisite experience, knowledge and skill in the people who the organisation would task to manage it.
Creating an internal, proprietary SOC involves the identification and purchasing of the necessary hardware and software, as well as the hiring of professionals with cybersecurity, network engineers and security analysis expertise to manage it.
Moreover, the upfront costs of setting this up are not a static, one-time cost to the organisation. Hardware needs to be patched up and replaced at the end of its support lifecycle, software must be kept up to date and continuously analysed to ensure that it still the best solution, and employees must keep abreast of new technologies, new risks and threats, and an ever-changing IT landscape.
Outsourcing the management of your SOC to external specialists can save your organisation both money and time by quickly reallocating this task to a team that has everything set up and ready to go and are invested in implementing best practices for their clients.
Ease of Expansion
Beyond the aforementioned swiftness of implementation, another critical aspect of any IT solution and practice, SOC included, is the ability to reconfigure it according to your organisation’s needs and predicament.
A solution that worked for your company during the startup phase may no longer be applicable once you have matured into a more mature operation. It may even become a security-related hindrance and source of concern.
By outsourcing your Security Operations Center to an external service provider, you retain the ability to quickly and painlessly scale up as your organisation evolves, with the only variable on your side of things being the rate you are charged, just as any other service.
Ceaseless Provision of Service
As mentioned above, cybersecurity threats and risks are far from consistent, they constantly evolve and adapt to whatever security measures are put in place to prevent data breaches and other acts by malicious actors from taking place.
An outsourced SOC involves an exhaustive auditing of your organisation’s systems and devices, uninterrupted and automated monitoring and threat detection, and swift response processes so that risks are dealt with quickly and efficiently. In addition, an outsourced SOC will be fed with new data from various Threat Intelligence sources to constantly keep your organisation’s security posture up to date with the latest threats.
Moreover, the service-level agreement (SLA) your organisation would sign with the SOC provider would allow you to finely define the level of service you are expected to receive.
This would include specific metrics and the general level of standard your provider would adhere to.
Critical information on the risks your organisation is facing
Seldom is proactivity more crucial than in cybersecurity. A state-of-the-art SOC is able to deal with threats before they cause irreversible harm to your organisation, whether through data, infrastructure or reputational loss.
In addition, an advanced outsourced SOC and the team involved with its operation will continuously stay atop any new developments in terms of new risks and update its threat intelligence accordingly.
How Boltonshield can help
Boltonshield’s Security Operations Center (SOC) services follow the Visibility Triad methodology, meaning that we will monitor and respond to any threats, incidents covering all your organisation’s attack surfaces. This allows us to detect, analyze, and respond to cybersecurity incidents on all endpoint devices regardless of the current network they are connected with, enabling you to safeguard employee devices even when they are being used remotely.
As the name suggests, the SOC Visibility Triad relies on three well-known core security elements:
- User and entity behaviour through security information and event management, a security strategy that is better known as SIEM.
- Network detection and response (NDR).
- Endpoint detection and response (EDR).
Boltonshield provides a fundamentally unique approach to cyber defence which is backed up by Artificial Intelligence. Rather than the traditional log collection and consolidation, Boltonshield’s Security Operations Center monitors network traffic, has visibility of every single device and user, and automatically learns the complex relationships between them.
Machine learning technology enables us to detect emerging threats, in real time, mapped in a way that provides total network visibility. This boosts our ability to quickly diagnose potential issues and act accordingly.
You can get in touch with us to find out exactly how Boltonshield can help you by clicking here.
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