SOAR stands for Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response. SOAR platforms are a collection of security software solutions and tools for browsing and collecting data from a variety of sources. SOAR solutions then use a combination of human and machine learning to analyze this diverse data in order to comprehend and prioritize incident response actions.

The term is used to describe three software capabilities – threat and vulnerability management, security incident response, and security operations automation. SOAR allows companies to collect threat-related data from a range of sources and automate the responses to the threat. The term was originally coined by Gartner, who also defined the three capabilities. Threat and vulnerability management (Orchestration) covers technologies that help amend cyber threats, while security operations automation (Automation) relates to the technologies that enable automation and orchestration within operations.

•  Automate Repeated Response Workflow
• Save Time for Higher Priority Triage Tasks
• Easy Standardized Response to follow

Working in security operations can be a constant struggle. Speed and efficiency are vital, but it can be challenging to ensure that all your systems are working in harmony. Analysts are frequently overwhelmed by the volume of alerts from disparate systems. Obtaining and correlating the necessary data to separate genuine threats from false positives can be an onerous task. Coordinating appropriate response measures to remediate those threats is yet another challenge.

The purpose of SOAR security is to alleviate all of these challenges by improving efficiency. It provides a standardized process for data aggregation to assist human and machine-led analysis and automates detection and response processes to help reduce alert fatigue, allowing analysts to focus on the tasks that require deeper human analysis and intervention.

• Consolidate process management, technology, and expertise
• Centralize asset monitoring
• Enrich alerts with contextual intelligence
• Automate response and perform inline blocking

SOAR and SIEM (Safety Information and Event Management) tools aim to address the same problem: the high volume of security-related information and events within organizations.

While SOAR platforms incorporate data collection, case management, standardization, workflow, and analysis, SIEMs analyze log data from different IT systems to search for security issues and alert engineers.

The two solutions can work in conjunction, with the SIEM detecting the potential security incidents and triggering the alerts and the SOAR solution responding to these alerts, triaging the data, and taking remediation steps where necessary. With SIEM platforms integrating SOAR-like functionality to increase response, SOAR can add significant value to an existing SIEM solution.

The main obstacle to the adoption of SOAR security continues to be the lack, or low maturity, of processes and procedures within SOC teams. This is why it is vital to gain expert advice when planning to implement SOAR.

Additional pitfalls associated with the implementation of SOAR are:

Unrealistic expectations: SOAR is not a silver bullet for addressing all security challenges. Organizations are at risk when implementing SOAR if they fail to set clearly defined use cases and realistic goals.

Over-reliance on automation: It is vital to avoid simply relying on the playbooks and processes initially set up in SOAR. Companies need to ensure that they apply up-to-date security expertise to ensure that their SOAR is continually ready to respond effectively to new types of threats.

Unclear metrics: Organisations are at risk of failing to gain the results they need from SOAR due to a failure to clearly define their parameters for success. It is important to understand the breadth of what they are trying to automate.

Incident response is the process of detecting security events that affect network resources and information assets and then taking the appropriate steps to evaluate and clean up what has happened. Cybersecurity incident response is critical to today's businesses because simply put, there is so much to lose. From the simplest of malware infections to unencrypted laptops that are lost or stolen to compromised login credentials and database exposures, both the short- and long-term ramifications of these incidents can have a lasting impact on the business.

Networks, software, and end-users can only reach a certain level of resilience. Oversights will occur, and mistakes will happen. What matters is what you have done, in advance, to minimize the impact of a security incident on your organization. You can't prevent hackers from existing, but you can be proactive in prevention and response. That's why having a functional team, the proper technologies, and a well-written incident response plan are essential for being able to respond to such events in a prompt and professional manner.

A good incident response program starts with building a great team. Without the right people, security policies, processes, and tools mean very little. An IR team is made up of a cross-functional group of people from diverse parts of the business, including IT and security, operations, legal and public relations. One or more of these roles could -- and should -- be at the executive management level. The reason for this is to ensure the highest level of decision-making and that the business's best interests are kept in mind.