How Managed SIEM and SOC-as-a-Service Help Overcome Security Challenges

Today’s threat landscape has made IT security more complex, making it difficult to protect systems and data. Organizations are constantly adding security tools to address evolving attack methods, an ever-expanding attack surface, and stricter regulatory requirements. As a result, many IT teams are struggling to manage a proliferation of point solutions and to separate real threats from false positives.

Security information and event management (SIEM) can reduce this complexity and give IT teams greater visibility across the security environment. SIEM also forms the foundation of a security operations center (SOC), where IT and security professionals continuously analyze the organization’s security posture.

However, SIEM is notoriously difficult and expensive to deploy, configure and manage. Even if an organization implements a SIEM solution, staffing a SOC 24×7 is likely out of reach.

Managed SIEM and SOC-as-a-Service give organizations cost-effective access to powerful tools and expertise. The managed services provider (MSP) takes responsibility for deploying and configuring the SIEM and providing around-the-clock monitoring and management.

The Value of SIEM

SIEM is a security management layer that aggregates and correlates data from multiple security tools and services using a rules-based system. Sophisticated tools analyze this data to detect anomalies. When a potential threat is identified, SIEM logs information about the threat and generates an alert so security teams can take steps to mitigate the threat.

Although SIEM involves collecting log data and providing centralized access to logs, there is far more to SIEM than log management. SIEM uses user identity and behavior tracking, geolocation data, device configurations, and application data to detect activity that deviates from normal and warrants an investigation.

Security analysts gain a unified view of system and network activity and can investigate anomalies and security incidents more quickly. In addition, data from within the organization is correlated with threat intelligence from reliable external sources. This makes it easier to distinguish legitimate threats from false positives.

Barriers to Success

A SOC goes a step further to minimize the time between compromise, detection and response. Security pros monitor activity and data across networks, servers, applications and devices to ensure that security incidents are quickly detected, analyzed, investigated, reported and mitigated.

Although the benefits are clear, there are major hurdles to SIEM implementation. Unifying disparate security tools into a single system is no small task. Configuring SIEM to collect the right data from disparate tools and then aggregate and correlate that data is a complex process. It’s also important to tune the SIEM solution to minimize the noise created by an avalanche of alerts. Alerts that warrant a closer look should be accompanied by security intelligence.

The inherent complexity of SIEM means deployment time is long. Plus, SIEM requires ongoing maintenance and upgrades. Cloud-based SIEM solutions eliminate upfront capital expenses and operational overhead but may not fully integrate with the organization’s security environment.

How SageNet Can Help

SageNet’s managed SIEM and SOC-as-Service solutions give you access to powerful security resources without the headache. Our tools fully integrate with your IT environment to enable proactive defense and fast remediation. All critical devices — servers, storage, databases, routers, switches, access points, security devices and more — are monitored across on-premises and cloud environments. Security data is enhanced with third-party intelligence feeds that are constantly updated with information on the latest threats.

While we recognize the value of AI-powered technology, human oversight is still needed to prevent threats from slipping through the cracks. Our experienced experts analyze the aggregated and correlated data to guide remediation. We also provide regular compliance reviews to ensure the highest level of protection.

Today’s threat cyber landscape requires an integrated, comprehensive approach to security. Let us show you how our managed SIEM and SOC-as-a-Service offerings enable you to detect threats and respond to incidents quickly and efficiently.