A security operations center (SOC) is a facility that houses an information security team responsible for monitoring and analyzing an organization’s security posture on an ongoing basis.
The SOC team’s goal is to detect, analyze, and respond to cybersecurity incidents using a combination of technology solutions and a strong set of processes.
Security operations centers monitor and analyze activity on networks, servers, endpoints, databases, applications, websites, and other systems, looking for anomalous activity that could be indicative of a security incident or compromise. The SOC is responsible for ensuring that potential security incidents are correctly identified, analyzed, defended, investigated, and reported.
Benefits of having a Security Operations Center
The key benefit of having a security operations center is the improvement of security incident detection through continuous monitoring and analysis of data activity.
The 24/7 monitoring provided by a SOC gives organizations an advantage to defend against incidents and intrusions, regardless of source, time of day, or attack type.
The gap between attackers’ time to compromise and enterprises’ time to detection is well documented in Verizon’s annual Data Breach Investigations Report, and having a security operations center helps organizations close that gap and stay on top of the threats facing their environments.