The industry or the type of organization does not matter. Cybersecurity has become an increasingly important topic for many companies, businesses, and organizations with a digital footprint, and cybercriminals are not making it easy. According to data from several trusted sources, there’s a growing surge in the number of cyber attacks that happen to organizations daily. Since it is a challenging issue, many organizations are trying their best to mitigate and prevent falling victim to cyber attackers’ antics.
One of the crucial security tools they are adopting is integrating security information and event management (SIEM) into their security operations center. However, even when adding SIEM to an IT infrastructure, certain things and factors must be considered to ensure that one does not make the wrong choice. Brace up, as this article will act as the ultimate guide, providing you with some of the features and factors determining your choice of SIEM system.
1. Provision of Real-time Monitoring and Alerting
One of the measurable metrics to evaluate SIEM systems is their ability to provide real-time monitoring of an organization’s network and subsequent alerting. In the fast-paced world of internet security, employing a passive security tool can be a liability. Hence, a need for real-time monitoring. Not only should a SIEM solution be able to detect when an attack is happening or about to happen, but it should also provide an alert at a very swift rate to immediately bring the security team to the scene when needed.
2. Log Collection and Management
This is a core functionality of any SIEM system and should not be overlooked when getting such a solution for a business or company. The SIEM system should not be limited to certain devices in log collection and management. Instead, it should be able to collect and manage data logs from IoT devices, security devices, software and applications, networks, cloud systems, and many others.
3. Integration of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning
Whenever you choose SIEM systems, ensure you go for those that integrate machine learning and artificial intelligence. Solutions such as Stellar Cyber have these integrations, enabling them to work more effectively and efficiently. How do they do this? Integrating AI and ML helps SIEM systems monitor and analyze large volumes of data logs and sources at record time. Furthermore, artificial intelligence can learn from past events and use it to make a more comprehensive, holistic, and accurate threat detection.
Another important part of having AI and ML within an SIEM solution is the automation it brings to the table, thereby eliminating some mechanical errors. Previously, many SIEM solutions relied on the security operations center to analyze and respond to threats. However, AI and ML bring in automation by analyzing a threat, providing the best response to curb such a threat, and, in some cases, executing the response.
4. Fast And Swift Response to Security Issues
In the digital world, timeliness determines if an organization goes ahead of its competitors or stays behind them. For instance, if an organization falls victim to a cyber attack, its ability to handle and stand up to its feet in the shortest time possible will go a long way.
Assuming there was an attack that led to website downtime, taking time to handle it could lead to a dent in reputation and even a massive loss in revenue. Thus, while choosing its security tools, an organization should select SIEM solutions that respond swiftly to any security incident.
5. Threat Investigations and Forensic Capabilities
SIEMs aren’t only about monitoring and responding to cyber threats — threat investigations and forensic capabilities are also crucial factors. A SIEM solution should be able to go back in the past to look into the step-by-step process of how a threat occurred and what can be done to prevent future occurrences. In cyber security, the little details matter a lot, and the ability of SIEMs to hold on and analyze these little details could go a long way.
6. Reporting Features
In many organizations, the security operations center (SOC) or the IT team must provide timely reports of security solutions to executives and auditors. Furthermore, many companies and businesses must comply with regulatory requirements that require these reports. Hence, any SIEM an organization chooses should be able to provide comprehensive reports that meet the requirements.
Any SIEM solution that generates its reports manually should be a red flag, as it is very time-consuming and susceptible to numerous errors. As per many expert recommendations, the SIEM solution should provide automatic reports for different use cases. For instance, it can provide reports used to study the occurrence of a security incident and those used for compliance matters or processes. An ideal SIEM solution should support other kinds of reports: the overall distribution graph, service usage, time series report, and network traffic.
7. Scalability
Scalability is an important issue when discussing SIEM and should play a huge role in determining if you choose a SIEM solution. One of the things constant in daily business operations is change, meaning an organization’s infrastructure can expand at any moment. During expansion, it is quite tricky for experts to predict or determine how much data such an organization will produce. So, when choosing a SIEM solution, an organization should choose one that can easily adjust to its expansion without taking too many costs.
8. Easy Deployment
Easy deployment is another thing to consider when discussing/choosing SIEM solutions. The security tools by Stellar Cyber offer easy SIEM deployment, and this creates room for better resource management and utilization. Furthermore, easy deployment allows for more cooperation among different organizational departments.
Wrapping Up
Looking back, SIEM solutions are security tools still relevant to organizations due to the sophisticated protection they offer users and organizations. However, an organization must analyze properly when they are choosing any SIEM solution.
