How To Build Your Own SOC

Building a Security Operations Center (SOC) can be enormous, taking time and resources from your current IT department if not planned or strategized correctly.

For companies that don’t have the internal resources to build their SOC, services such as WatServ’s CloudSecure cybersecurity solutions can take on this load for them.

Some businesses, however, like to build their SOC in-house but need help figuring out where to begin. So, what does it take?

We’ve taken the three building blocks of SOCs and detailed what you need to do to ensure they’re covered.

People

A SOC requires a team of people with a dedicated role in incident response or analysis. These don’t have to be internally hired and could include outsourcing or hiring specialists to provide support in critical areas.

They should be capable of managing a project from start to finish and have a particular skill set relating to the role. On top of this, training and certification are vital. People hired for the SOC team should be able to handle incidents under pressure and have excellent problem-solving skills. You may also wish to offer training to the right person, but they must be able to handle the workload.

In the event of a surge in incidents, you may need to call upon such a team to help handle the load. Some outsourcing SOC services can provide this support.

Processes

A range of standardizations are available within the cybersecurity industry to help you define your processes. NIST, PCI, HIPPA and ISO27001 are all widely accepted as strong security controls and aligning a business’s processes to these shows customers your dedication to keeping their data secure.

Better than that, they’ll also help you define your processes, including incident and patch management. Having a clearly defined set of instructions with roles for each team member will mean a structured handling of incidents and a less chaotic feeling, especially knowing that the designated teams will handle everything.

Technology

While having the best team and processes can help you achieve your SOC goals, you will need some technology to make it possible.

Intrusion Detection and Prevention, anti-virus and anti-malware, and security auditing and scanning software are some excellent tools that have been on the market for a while. Some newer technologies can help your SOC capture more of what is going on in your network.

With Security, Incident, and Event log Management systems (SIEM), you can gather logs from devices and systems across your network and in the cloud and use these as a jumping-off point for investigations. These usually come with automation processes which can significantly reduce the SOC team’s workload.

It will also be of value to conduct penetration testing regularly (interpret based on your needs) on your network to assess for weak points. This process is better outsourced to avoid bias when testing.

Most importantly, when building a SOC, keep up with new cybersecurity trends and technologies to ensure your systems are as protected as possible.