The security operations center as a service (SOCaaS), or SOC as a service, is gaining momentum. The reason is that it addresses some of the main challenges faced by most companies, while at the same time seeking to meet other objectives, such as financial, security and compliance, among other benefits achieved by the SOC.

Essentially, the term SOCaaS refers to a type of cloud-based managed security service (MSS) built on a software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform with the ability to serve several customers at the same time in parallel.

SOC as a service goes beyond MSS, with offerings from traditional managed security service providers (MSSPs). It brings together monitoring, detection, incident response (MDR), vulnerability analysis and intrusion testing solutions.

Like MSS, SOCaaS includes all the monitoring and management of firewalls, anti-virus and anti-spam systems, virtual private networks (VPNs), endpoint protection (EPP) and endpoint detection and response (EDR).

In addition, SOCaaS provides access to a team of analysts to resolve all alerts, identify and analyze indicators of compromise, analyze and respond to attacks to minimize the impact of security incidents, providing assistance in optimizing an organization's protection, detection and response resources through continuous evaluation and reporting, including guidance on security strategies and policies.

For this reason, SOCaaS is considered an evolution of MSS and MDR. Although the term SOCaaS is more current, organizations that have been in the market longer still offer solutions that meet the definition of SOC as a service within MDR offerings.

So it's important to remember that organizations should focus on the benefits of solutions that meet the definition of SOC, rather than worrying about whether these services are called SOCaaS or not.

The term SOCaaS is gaining popularity in a threat landscape that requires companies to have comprehensive detection and response capabilities that go beyond the boundaries of the corporate environment. And it should become the dominant term among organizations looking for the best business security management.

Is SOC synonymous with peace of mind?

The attack surface of most companies has expanded. And it's set to grow further as workforces become increasingly remote, with people accessing corporate network applications, systems, services and data from everywhere, thanks to the cloud. This trend translates into an opportunity for cyber criminals.

Companies have invested in monitoring tools to keep data protection up to date. However, for many of them, security alerts generated on a daily basis pile up, creating an avalanche of data that goes unanalyzed.

SOC as a Service solves the gap. It also offers a solution to other critical challenges in companies, including:

• The need to expand security monitoring to include cloud devices, operational technology (OT) and the Internet of Things (IoT);
• Many companies acquire prevention technologies in the belief that the tools are sufficient, forgetting that, along with acquiring new resources, they need to coordinate training, implement usage policies and set goals to be achieved;
• Finding, training and retaining experienced security professionals has become a major obstacle for companies of all sizes;
• Difficulty in understanding day-to-day operational procedures;
• Building your own Security Operations Center is expensive;
• The need to generate more value from the resources invested in security, so that the entire leadership can see that the cost of not investing in protection can be much higher;
• Spending energy on business risk instead of operations;
• Specific data protection laws must be complied with.

A SOCaaS analyzes the risk to which the company is exposed and then devises the most appropriate response strategy. The knowledge of the Threat Intelligence team, which continuously researches and collects information, is combined with the learning of Artificial Intelligence (AI). The result is a Detection and Response Service (MDR) that eliminates alert fatigue and false positives, and promotes a faster response, specific to the organization's reality.

Security triad

The basis of the work of a SOCaas needs to be what we call the security triad: people, processes and products. A combination of talent, technology and experience in protecting, so that companies have a security architecture that follows the best practices in the market. Thus, a SOC in this format is able to serve any organization, regardless of the security structure it has, and the complexity and maturity of the environment. It monitors the various existing technologies holistically and without borders, and acts on any surface.

The security triad encompasses the following company structures:

Cloud - visibility in the cloud environment, on all the main platforms used by the market;

Network - monitoring capable of reaching companies' different network architectures;

Systems - constantly searches for alerts on all multiple operating systems;

Applications - the variety of business applications today is enormous; SOCaaS checks them all;

Devices - the range of end devices is growing, such as workstations, smartphones, tablets and servers; the SOC analyzes each one without borders.

SOC-as-a-service offerings address crucial challenges of the digital age. That's why they need to be part of any mature cybersecurity strategy.