Incident response | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

How do you overcome today's talent gap in cybersecurity? This is a crucial issue — particularly when you find executive leadership or the board asking pointed questions about your security team's ability to defend the organization against new and current threats. This is why many security leaders find themselves turning to managed security services like MDR ( managed detection and response ), which can offer an immediate solution. The right MDR partner can act as an extension of your existing team, while offering a fast and budget-friendly option for uplevelling security at organizations of virtually any size. Here's a look at common staffing challenges that MDR helps solve: Overcoming Cybersecurity Talent Challenges From stopping ransomware to securing the attack surface of the environment, most security teams have more to do than they can manage. This leads to security gaps that increase both cyber risk and frustration for stakeholders across the business. The challe

A hospital with 2,000 employees in the E.U. deployed Cynet protections across its environment. The hospital was in the process of upgrading several expensive imaging systems that were still supported by Windows XP and Windows 7 machines. Cynet protections were in place on most of the Windows XP and Windows 7 machines during the upgrade process, ensuring that legacy operating systems would not cause vulnerabilities or delay the activation of an  incident response plan . The hospital's I.T. security team appreciated this coverage after their previous provider abandoned support for Windows XP and Windows 7. "One of the many reasons we chose Cynet was their support of legacy Windows machines. It's expensive, difficult and time consuming to upgrade our imaging system software, but we needed protections as we slowly migrated to more current Windows environments. Cynet was one of the few providers that continue to protect these older Windows environments." The Attack Alo

Rapid technological evolution requires security that is resilient, up to date and adaptable. In this article, we will cover the transformation in the field of DFIR (digital forensics and incident response) in the last couple years, focusing on the digital forensics' aspect and how XDR fits into the picture. Before we dive into the details, let's first break down the main components of DFIR and define the differences between them. Digital Forensics vs Incident Response Digital forensics:  the practice of using scientific techniques and tools to identify, preserve, and analyze digital evidence from various sources, such as computers, smartphones, and other electronic devices, in a way that is admissible in a court of law. Incident response:  the process of responding to and managing the aftermath of a security breach or cyberattack. This involves identifying the nature and scope of the incident, containing the damage, eradicating the threat, and restoring the affected syst

Organizations rely on Incident response to ensure they are immediately aware of security incidents, allowing for quick action to minimize damage. They also aim to avoid follow on attacks or future related incidents. The SANS Institute provides research and education on information security. In the upcoming webinar, we'll outline , in detail, six components of a SANS incident response plan, including elements such as preparation, identification, containment, and eradication. The 6 steps of a complete IR Preparation:  This is the first phase and involves reviewing existing security measures and policies; performing risk assessments to find potential vulnerabilities; and establishing a communication plan that lays out protocols and alerts staff to potential security risks. During the holidays, the preparation stage of your IR plan is crucial as it gives you the opportunity to communicate holiday-specific threats and put the wheels in motion to address such threats as they are identif

Tis the season for security and IT teams to send out that company-wide email: "No, our CEO does NOT want you to buy gift cards."  As much of the workforce signs off for the holidays, hackers are stepping up their game. We'll no doubt see an increase in activity as hackers continue to unleash e-commerce scams and holiday-themed phishing attacks. Hackers love to use these tactics to trick end users into compromising not only their personal data but also their organization's data.  But that doesn't mean you should spend the next couple of weeks in a constant state of anxiety.  Instead, use this moment as an opportunity to ensure that your incident response (IR) plan is rock solid.  Where to start?  First, make sure that your strategy follows the six steps to complete incident response.  Here's a refresher: The 6 steps of a complete IR Preparation:  This is the first phase and involves reviewing existing security measures and policies; performing risk assessments to find potentia

Security incidents occur. It's not a matter of "if," but of "when." That's why you implemented security products and procedures to optimize the incident response (IR) process. However, many security pros who are doing an excellent job in handling incidents find effectively communicating the ongoing process with their management a much more challenging task. Feels familiar? In many organizations, leadership is not security savvy, and they aren't interested in the details regarding all the bits and bytes in which the security pro masters.  Luckily, there is a template that security leads can use when presenting to management. It's called the  IR Reporting for Management template , providing CISOs and CIOs with a clear and intuitive tool to report both the ongoing IR process and its conclusion. The IR Reporting for Management template enables CISOs and CIOs to communicate with the two key points that management cares about—assurance that the incid

A new class of security tools is emerging that promises to significantly improve the effectiveness and efficiency of threat detection and response. Emerging Extended Detection and Response (XDR) solutions aim to aggregate and correlate telemetry from multiple detection controls and then synthesize response actions. XDR has been referred to as the next step in the evolution of Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) solutions. Because XDR represents a new solution category, there is no single accepted definition of what capabilities and features should (and shouldn't) be included. Each provider approaches XDR with different strengths and perspectives on how what an XDR solution should include. Therefore, selecting an XDR provider is quite challenging as organizations must organize and prioritize a wide range of capabilities that can differ significantly between providers. Cynet is now addressing this need with the Definitive RFP Template for XDR solutions ( download here ),

As a CSIRT consultant, I cannot overemphasize the importance of effectively managing the first hour in a critical incident. Finding out what to do is often a daunting task in a critical incident. In addition, the feeling of uneasiness often prevents an incident response analyst from making effective decisions. However, keeping a cool head and actions planned out is crucial in successfully handling a security incident. This blog will elaborate on some key points to help readers facilitate better incident response procedures. Preparation is essential Before taking on any incidents, security analysts would need to know a great deal of information. To start off, incident response analysts need to familiarize themselves with their roles and responsibilities. IT infrastructure has evolved rapidly over the past years. For example, we observed increasing movement to cloud computing and data storage. The fast-changing IT environment frequently requires analysts to update their skill sets,

The unfortunate truth is that while companies are investing more in cyber defenses and taking cybersecurity more seriously than ever, successful breaches and ransomware attacks are on the rise. While a successful breach is not inevitable, it is becoming more likely despite best efforts to prevent it from happening.  Just as it wasn't raining when Noah built the ark, companies must face the fact that they need to prepare - and educate the organization on - a well-thought-out response plan if a successful cyberattack does occur. Obviously, the worst time to plan your response to a cyberattack is when it happens. With so many companies falling victim to cyberattacks, an entire cottage industry of Incident Response (IR) services has arisen. Thousands of IR engagements have helped surface best practices and preparedness guides to help those that have yet to fall victim to a cyberattack.  Recently, cybersecurity company Cynet provided an  Incident Response plan Word template  to help com

Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) platforms have received incredible attention as the platform for security teams. Whether you're evaluating an EDR for the first time or looking to replace your EDR, as an information security professional, you need to be aware of the gaps prior already to implementation so you can best prepare how to close the gaps. It's important to understand that each company is unique, and an EDR that a large company uses might not necessarily be the technology that works best when you are leading a small security team, even if you're within the same industry vertical. Understanding your threat detection technology requirements based on your unique company characteristics will help you choose the right one.  The eBook and webinar "The Dark Side of EDR. Are You Prepared?" helps you in that requirement definition process. It points out the dark side(s) of EDR and provides guidance as to how to overcome them according to your company'

Network Detection & Response (NDR) is an emerging technology developed to close the blind security spots left by conventional security solutions, which hackers exploited to gain a foothold in target networks. Nowadays, enterprises are using a plethora of security solutions to protect their network from cyber threats. The most prominent ones are Firewalls, IPS/IDS, SIEM, EDR, and XDR (which combines the functionality of EDR and SIEM). However, all these solutions suffer from security gaps that prevent them from stopping advanced cyber-attacks efficiently.  NDR was developed based on Intrusion Detection System (IDS). An IDS solution is installed on the network perimeter and monitors the network traffic for suspicious activities. IDS systems suffer from many downsides that make them inefficient in stopping modern cyber-attacks: IDS use signature-based detection techniques to discover abnormal activities, making them unable to spot unknown attacks. In addition, IDS systems trigger

The Incident Response (IR) services market is in accelerated growth due to the rise in cyberattacks that result in breaches. More and more organizations, across all sizes and verticals, choose to outsource IR to 3rd party service providers over handling security incidents in-house. Cynet is now launching a first-of-its-kind offering, enabling any Managed Security Provider (MSP) or Security Integrator (SI) to add Incident Response to its services portfolio, without building an in-house team of incident responders, by using Cynet's IR team and technology at no cost. Managed Service providers interested to add Incident Response to their service portfolio with no investment in people or technology can apply here . As cyber threats grow in sophistication and volume, there is an increasing number of cases in which attackers succeed in compromising the environments they target. This, in turn, fuels a rapidly growing demand for IR technologies and services. Since in most cases

Security incidents occur. It's not a matter of 'if' but of 'when.' There are security products and procedures that were implemented to optimize the IR process, so from the 'security-professional' angle, things are taken care of. However, many security pros who are doing an excellent job in handling incidents find effectively communicating the ongoing process with their management a much more challenging task. It's a little surprise — managements are typically not security savvy and don't really care about the bits and bytes in which the security pro masters. Cynet addresses this gap with the IR Reporting for Management PPT template , providing CISOs and CIOs with a clear and intuitive tool to report both the ongoing IR process and its conclusion. The IR for Management template enables CISOs and CIOs to communicate with the two key points that management cares about—assurance that the incident is under control and a clear understanding of imp

We have all heard of the "cybersecurity skills gap" — firms' inability to hire and retain high-level cybersecurity talent. I see this gap manifesting in two ways. First, companies that want to hire cybersecurity talent simply cannot find candidates with sufficient skills. Second, companies that cannot afford specialized cybersecurity talent and therefore lack the necessary skills to adequately protect their organizations from the growing and increasingly sophisticated cyber threats. Both of these are real problems, and both can lead to devastating consequences. It's also fair to say that most cybersecurity teams today are overworked and understaffed. One of the primary reasons we need such high-level cybersecurity skills lies in the shortcomings of cybersecurity technologies. Due to the changing and increasingly sophisticated stream of attack techniques, the breadth and depth of cybersecurity defensive technologies used to combat these threats and protect org