Is cybersecurity automation the future?

In the current technology-driven world, cyber-attacks aren’t the exception anymore, they’re the rule. As more businesses shift to implementing more IT infrastructure, this increases their risk of cyber threats and attacks.

At the same time, hackers are constantly finding new ways to exploit emerging technology. Automation is increasingly being used as a new strategy for cyber-attacks, to penetrate networks quickly and without detection.

Automated cybersecurity tools are increasingly important in the age of automated cyber-attacks. It's essential to use them in order to stay one step ahead of malicious actors.

Automated security can do things humans can't, saving time and effort in protecting against malicious attacks.

Cybersecurity automation

Agile defences are needed more than ever before to stand up to all the constant security breaches. The right mixture of ingredients will help set up an efficient security program that will be strong enough against any attack.

Automation of cybersecurity has become very popular due to its effectiveness in tackling cyber-attacks without human assistance. Security teams spend less time on menial tasks while the software is efficiently handling any problems it finds.

Analytics, intelligence, and automation are key to transitioning to proactive security in order to take control of one's environment and schedule. Investigating alerts and then remediating the reason for the alert slows down systems, and possibly disrupts operations.

Security automation can do many things, like detect potential threats in your business IT environment, triage the event to find out if it's legitimate or fake, and then contain and resolve the threat. These actions take automated security tools seconds, independent of human intervention.

Cybersecurity automation reduces alert fatigue in security teams by investigating alerts, detecting threats, and mitigating the impact of attacks.

What type of cybersecurity automation is needed?

As attacks by malicious elements escalate, it's more important than ever to be proactive about identifying potential threats to your organisation. One of the main ways to minimise risks is through automation.

Automation can be done through a process called mapping out a security framework. This process will identify all of the potential risky endpoints which are vulnerable to being breached and then establish parameters for how these should be handled. Endpoints are remote computing devices that communicate back and forth with a connected network.

Cybersecurity automation tools can be any of the following:

• Security automation and orchestration (SOAR) products, e.g. Microsoft Sentinel
• Robotic process automation (RPA)
• Software that automates processes and performs analysis.

Whatever the tool is implemented, it requires an integrated approach to filter data from each endpoint. Automation makes this process both rapid and efficient, filtering vast amounts of data to detect and mitigate potential threats. This automation solution should have artificial intelligence as a driving force as well as machine learning and data analytics to provide the best possible output.

AI provides better insight for decision-making, while machine learning does all the work in detecting and identifying threats. It also prevents users from being targeted by constantly monitoring the behaviour of a network for anomalies.

With the rising success of AI in the workplace, it's time for businesses to start adopting automation solutions that leverage analytics, intelligence, and automation. It is not possible for humans to successfully do everything on their own without incurring errors.

What are the key benefits of cybersecurity automation?

As the world moves to a digital economy, cybersecurity becomes more important for businesses. However, cybersecurity is not just about defending against cyber-attacks. It is also about protecting data from being leaked accidentally, due to human errors or system malfunctions.

With the rise of artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies, it's possible that organisations can use these tools to automate many of the tasks they would have previously done manually.

Increased efficiency

Automation is making it possible for businesses to quickly respond to threats, which can have a dramatic impact on the bottom line. With automation, companies are able to process data more efficiently, so they can quickly identify and address any problems that arise. Automation also allows security teams to do things in the same way every time, which means fewer mistakes are being made.

A ton of data is available in protecting against cyber-attacks, but it needs to be organised into steps that can be taken.

The information from your security technology is meaningless if you can’t act on it, and the volume of data prevents a human from being able to keep up.

Cybersecurity automation lets you organise all your data to more clearly identify threats and also the actions you need to take. It’s important to pick software that collects data from your internal security tools and can connect with available external sources.

Improved security posture

Security has to be a top priority in all industries, whether it's protecting software, networks, or information. Security posture refers to the overall state of security readiness for an organisation. Having visibility into IT security status is important because it provides insight into the quality of controls and measures in place to detect, respond and recover from cyber-attacks. This allows security professionals to discover and implement improvements needed.

Automation tools can process data much faster than it takes a human to do the same task, with far less risk of mistakes or false positives. This leads to better analytical capabilities, and the decision-making process for threat detection becomes more structured, improving detection and prevention, overall increasing the security posture of an organisation.

Cost effective

It’s virtually impossible for humans to perform the amount of data processing and work required for effective cybersecurity. An in-house team of security experts would need to spend an increasing number of work hours focused on reacting to alerts, detecting and determining how serious the threat is, and containing and preventing attacks from infiltrating the organisation network.

Aside from the limitations on human hours being able to manage security operations to consistently protect IT networks, it leaves almost no time for security teams to focus on proactively designing security strategies or managing other areas of information technology operations.

Constant threats can disrupt and even stall business operations, and a serious breach can lead to more disastrous outcomes. In 2021, cybercrime is predicted to cause damages of $6 trillion USD globally. This figure is predicted to increase by 15% over the next five years.

Cybercrime is costing the Australian economy about $3.5 billion a year, with an average cost to business of $276,323 – more than half of that cost is detection and recovery.

In some cases, large security attacks have succeeded because security teams are struggling to manage the increased threats, leading to security vulnerabilities, which can ultimately lead to data breaches, lost revenue, and brand erosion.

Automating security operations is a cost-effective way of increasing productivity and efficiency. It helps ensure security systems are running smoothly and staff are not tied up with manual tasks like monitoring logs.

Protecting faster than threats happen

Cyber attackers now use automation to move quickly and deploy new threats, looking to find security vulnerabilities and maximise them at lightning speed. The only way to stay ahead of cyber attackers is to move faster than they can and apply an automated cybersecurity approach to protect networks and data.

Use of artificial intelligence and other digital technologies provides a better insight into the threat landscape and identifies patterns that can’t be spotted by humans. Automated security platforms rapidly analyse data and create an attack DNA, so unknown threats can quickly become known ones. The platform can also automatically create a full set of protections to instantly stop any future attacks.

With automation, creating new protection measures is far more streamlined, and as cyberthreats evolve, it’s a far simpler process of adjusting to meet those new threats.

As the pace of business digital transformation accelerates, the more connected the world becomes and the greater the risk of cyber threats and attacks will be.

Automation is the future of the cybersecurity industry. To find out how to make your business’ critical data more secure, talk to the IT security experts at Essential Tech