Threat hunting is a relatively new concept in the realm of cybersecurity. It is a proactive approach that aims to identify, investigate, and respond to information security threats that exist on an organization’s network or in its systems.
It is an important process to adopt in order to stay ahead of the growing number of cyberattacks that exist in the modern era.
What is threat hunting?
Threat hunting occurs when an organization discovers a system or system vulnerability which poses a risk to the organization’s network.
There are two methods for discovering the vulnerabilities that exist in a network. The first is to actively seek them out. While this can be a time consuming and labor intensive process, it’s still the preferred method of locating vulnerabilities in organizations.
The other is more proactive. This method is done once security analysts notice an incident that compromises a system or system software and, as part of their regular security practices, looks to improve it or understand it in order to avoid a similar occurrence in the future.
Why is threat hunting important?
Threat hunting is about more than preventing cyberattacks or preventing breaches. By monitoring for indicators of threats, threat hunting helps organizations identify new ways to discover and respond to potential threats in their environment. The goal of threat hunting is not to predict potential or impending attacks. Instead, it’s about proactively investigating ways to prevent cyberattacks.
This means not waiting for attacks to happen, but instead proactively finding them. How do threat hunters work?
Threat hunters conduct both automated and manual threat hunting activities. Sometimes, they use tools to help accomplish this. Other times, they will perform extensive manual research to understand an organization’s cyber defenses and how they’re configured.
Threat hunting as a process
While threat hunting might sound simple, the process of threat hunting is anything but that. There are a few unique processes that you must understand in order to carry out this approach successfully. Your first step should be to determine what a threat is.
According to the NIST Cybersecurity Framework, a threat is: a rapidly spreading, malicious software or data attack that can damage a computer, network, data or a computer system.
An attack may use any of a number of different methods, including attacking a system through a vulnerability or executing a program in order to extract data. In other words, threats can come in many forms. You also need to ensure that you have defined your target.
Threat hunting as a team
Threat hunting is not as complicated as it may seem at first. It is generally a highly effective strategy for when an organization identifies a new threat in its network or some kind of suspicious activity within a system.
It requires a combination of advanced threat detection software with some experience to properly guide the user in order to identify the threat and create a response plan.
It also requires the appropriate expertise and experience to conduct threat hunting. It is not as easy as scanning your network with a traditional scanner and responding to any issues. It is also important to note that threat hunting can be conducted on your own or as a part of a partnership with another organization.
Conclusion
You can learn a lot about what to do and what to avoid when it comes to business practices that don’t conform to good cyber hygiene practices. You can avoid these issues by simply paying attention to what you are doing, why you are doing it, and how it affects your organization.
The more you learn, the easier it will be to stay ahead of security risks that may affect your organization. If you would like to find out more information on how to improve your cyber hygiene practices, go to the following link.