Indicators of compromise play an important role in detecting cybersecurity threats and responding to security events in time. By learning how to identify these indicators, you can stop potential malicious activity from developing into a full attack and thus save your data and resources. This is usually the job of the onboard cybersecurity team. However, if you own or operate a smaller business that doesn’t have a team of security professionals, learning how to identify these indicators yourself can save you major losses in the future.
What Are Indicators of Compromise?
According to SearchSecurity, indicators of compromise or IOCs are pieces of forensic data that serve to identify possible malicious activity within a network. These pieces of data are usually found in system log entries or files and they help IT professionals spot red flags that could evolve into real data breaches or malware infections.
Cybersecurity teams usually monitor these indicators of compromise to detect suspicious activity before it turns into a threat. That way, professionals can limit potential damage and stop attacks even in the earliest stages. However, identifying these indicators is not as easy as it sounds.
In most cases, many of these indicators won’t make much sense at first glance. It takes an experienced eye to find the correlation between the red flags and put all the pieces together to spot a potential threat. Keep in mind that the indicators of compromise should not be confused with indicators of attack, which refer to forensic data tied to a compromise that has already taken place.
In other words, the indicators of attack are used to identify what had happened within the network, rather than spot red flags before something happens. While it is important to take both IOCs and IOAs into consideration, keep in mind that you need to look for the indicators of compromise if you’re hoping to spot threats before they turn into data breaches.
Use Indicators of Compromise to Detect Threats
To boost your threat detection system, you should monitor several indicators of compromise, including unusual outbound network traffic, strange log-in activities, increases in database read volume, unusual DNS requests, signs of DDoS activity, and suspicious system file changes. These are only a few out of many examples of indicators of compromise, which you should learn more about before starting the monitoring procedure.
By collecting and analyzing these indicators in real-time, you can create a more accurate attack response and use the right tools to stop the incident. Speaking of tools, there are plenty of software products you can use to identify potential threats. However, with cybercrime becoming more and more advanced, some of these indicators can easily go unnoticed.
That is why learning to look for these indicators or hiring a security expert to do so can change the way you manage the security of your network. The cybersecurity community also encourages companies and organizations to report the results of their monitoring and document the whole process consistently. By providing this data you could help others in the industry to automate the process of detecting indicators of compromise.
Organizations that properly monitor their IOCs and keep track of even the slightest changes in their network are far less likely to suffer from a large cybersecurity attack. Once you know what’s coming, it is much easier to prepare and prevent the damage on time. If you choose to improve your IOC monitoring, make sure to report your results within the community to aid the development of AI tools that could automate this process in the future
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