October 18, 2023

JuiceIT Guest Blog | From threat to action: How XDR can help when time is of the essence

Corien Vermaak
Director Cyber Security ANZ at CISCO

The only thing worse than cyber threats is an inability to detect those threats in time. Organisations need the right tools and strategies to ensure their data is secure and they can quickly identify any potential issues. XDR, or Extended Detection & Response, can provide excellent visibility and, proactive threat detection giving your security teams the opportunity to act on top concerns before they become massive breaches — keeping confidential information safe from attackers.

As cyber threats continue to evolve and become more pervasive, organisations of all sizes must be prepared to take an active role in their cyber security strategies. Organisations need the correct tools and strategies to ensure their data is secure and they can quickly identify any potential issues. An XDR solution provides a comprehensive view into security events at different points across an organisation’s environment, providing businesses with more visibility, proactive threat detection, and faster mitigation of incidents.

Tools and strategies need to be fit for purpose and reduce noise for the security practitioners. XDR (Extended Detection & Response) represents a powerful new tool for defending against these kinds of attacks, bringing together multiple streams of data into a unified view for faster analysis and identifying emerging risks before they cause damage.

In this blog, we’ll explore how XDR helps Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs) gain meaningful insight into the top security concerns facing their organisations, delivering actionable intelligence that can help protect against even the most sophisticated threats.

Navigating the challenges of cyber security

Cyber security has become a top priority. With the increase in cyber attacks over recent years and the impact of these breaches on businesses big and small, it’s no surprise that concerns about protecting business data have skyrocketed. Australia has seen a tremendous increase in large breaches over the past 12 months, and this has become a concern for everybody in the industry.

When I speak to CISO’s, one of the biggest challenges they face is ensuring resources are available to maintain security operations. Skills and expertise are critical components of a healthy security architecture. With an increasing number of complex tools available on the market, it can be difficult to decide what works best for your system’s defence. One key strategy is simplifying IT architecture and its dependencies wherever possible, so that teams can work faster and can be more efficient at response times for detecting breaches and preventing attacks. Investing in skilled people and using modifiable tools can provide the agility needed to respond quickly in a rapidly changing environment.

Experiencing a security breach can be devastating to any size company and action must be taken immediately. XDR is beneficial for businesses that want to detect an attack in real-time and respond with actionable security measures. XDR provides actionable visibility by combining multiple technologies into one platform, enabling faster detection and response to potential threats. Automation is also key in security, as the right tools need to be in place to identify threats fast. XDR helps organisations become better prepared to reduce the time between identification and containment of security incidents.

XDR delivers real-time actionable security measures

To help combat alert fatigue and be more efficient, actionable XDR benefit resources are key tools for companies to automate their workflows. By combining data from existing safety systems, IT can quickly identify malicious activity with dashboards that make it easy to find actionable opportunities. XDR provides companies the ability to set customisable alerts and notifications specific to their businesses’ security needs; this enables organisations to automatically respond much faster than they would be able to manually scanning through unexpected alerts or false-positive reports. This also ensures that the solution is fit for purpose and can help people focus on the possible risks. Ultimately, actionable XDR benefit resources provide organisations with a much-needed layer of automation in order to quickly address any potential malicious threats or attacks.

While businesses of all shapes and sizes have been using XDR for some time, there is still so much potential unaddressed. We have an opportunity to not only make a difference in our own organisations but also help address industry-wide concerns like people and skills shortages. With capabilities like automation built into XDR solutions, we can truly make a difference in operations.

Are you ready to take your cyber security strategy to the next level?

To learn how you can protect your organisations with Cisco XDR, contact Data#3 to speak to a specialist today or request a demo.