Is it Really That Much of a Problem?

Whenever a new idea becomes popular in the security industry, it’s tempting to dismiss it. So many “important” ideas have come and gone over the years that security leaders are naturally skeptical when they’re told they “can’t ignore” something.

In the case of alert fatigue, though, the case is clear:

• ESG research discovered that the #1 challenge for more than a third (35%) of all security teams is keeping up with alert volume.
• Exabeam found that almost half (45%) of security personnel believe their SOC is understaffed. Almost two-thirds of security personnel felt their SOC needed at least 2-10 additional staff.
• Worst of all, Cisco discovered that on average security teams can only process 56% of the alerts they receive.

So not only are security teams overwhelmed by incoming alerts, almost half of all alerts are never even investigated.

Fighting Alert Fatigue with SOAR

First off, there’s nothing you can do to prevent the number of alerts coming in. You wouldn’t even want to, given that you’ve invested heavily in a variety of security technologies in order to access those alerts.

But what you can do is improve the processes your security team uses to handle alerts and arm them with the tools they need to identify and remediate the most important alerts first.

Essentially, three things needed to improve alert management and reduce alert fatigue:

1. Remove false positives
2. Automate as much as possible
3. Help analysts process incidents faster

And all three of these enhancements can be achieved using SOAR.

SOAR platforms are a single, centralized location for security teams to manage incidents and alerts. They incorporate real-time threat intelligence, which makes it possible to automatically identify and reject so-called “false positive” alerts before they ever reach a human analyst. This alone drastically reduces the potential for alert fatigue.

SOAR platforms also enable analysts to access the functionality from all of the security technologies they need without needing to switch back-and-forth between systems. This is a game-changer in terms of productivity.

Best of all, SOAR platforms make it easy to develop effective, consistent security processes and incorporate powerful automation functionality that substantially reduces the amount of manual work needed to process an alert.

SIRP is the only SOAR platform with in-built risk management — a fully customizable module that helps security teams allocate their time and resources even more effectively by mapping cyber risk to individual assets (using any risk framework) and prioritize them across the organization.

To find out how SIRP can empower your security teams to fight back against alert fatigue, book a personalized demo today.