Now you know what information you need to collect to achieve your goals. This is a crucial step, but raw data is only the starting point. Let’s now look at how to effectively process and analyze the information you’ve collected to get the most out of your cyber threat intelligence data.
Process the Data
The data processing phase is where you transform the raw data you’ve collected into useful information. This is the point at which you extract the meaningful information from your categorized data and turn it into a solid base for decision-making.
Imagine that you are identifying and categorizing the latest vulnerabilities. Unless you process the data, it’s not actionable. This phase includes the following steps:
Identify the vulnerabilities likely to impact your organization (depending on the IS and technologies used).
Prioritize them according to their criticality.
Learn more about how threat actors exploit vulnerabilities.
Prioritize corrective and preventive actions to keep security levels as high as possible.
Let’s imagine your company uses a particular piece of database management software. Your threat intelligence reveals that a new vulnerability has been identified in this software. Processing this raw data would involve:
a relevance assessment: You determine whether this vulnerability affects one of the versions of the software your company uses. It does, so you move on to the next step.
a criticality analysis: This is the point at which you read the alert report in detail to find out more. You learn that the vulnerability lets any attacker become administrator of the system running the software, all from the internet and without any special access privileges. The end result: intrusion, propagation, data leak, and potentially more. It’s very critical!
exploitation by threat actors: When you learn that attackers are actively exploiting the vulnerability, it becomes even more crucial to quickly identify the attack methods they’re using.
an action plan: The software company has not yet released any updates to correct the vulnerability. For now, workarounds are the only solution. For example, if the vulnerability relates to SSH access, you could implement a temporary fix by blocking access to SSH ports from the internet, effectively reducing your exposure to potential attackers and minimizing risks while you wait for an official patch.
The aim of this step is to structure the data in a way that makes it ready for in-depth analysis.
Analyze Your Threat Intelligence Results
Analyzing threat intelligence results is an essential skill for any cybersecurity professional. It involves more than simply processing data. This analysis transforms the processed data into operational, tactical, or strategic insights that you can use to understand not only what’s happening, but also why it’s happening and how to respond effectively.
This phase includes the following steps:
Analyze trends to identify emerging patterns in the data.
Assess the risks associated with specific vulnerabilities or threats.
Make recommendations based on the analyzed data to guide cybersecurity actions.
Let’s continue with the previous scenario. Analyzing the data you’ve collected to identify a vulnerability in your company’s database management software would involve:
a trend analysis: Your team reviews past reports to determine whether similar vulnerabilities have occurred previously and how the software company managed them. This trend analysis helps you understand the frequency and severity of problems affecting this software, giving you a picture of overall system reliability and potential long-term risks.
a risk assessment: You assess the risks associated with this specific vulnerability. This involves considering the potential impact on the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of the data the software manages. You look at factors such as the sensitivity of the data stored, the ease of exploiting the vulnerability, and the consequences of a potential attack.
making recommendations: Based on this analysis, you draw up a series of recommendations. This could include immediate steps, such as applying a security patch, changing security configurations, or implementing workarounds. It may also include strategic recommendations, such as reassessing your use of the software or exploring safer alternatives.
It’s also important to demonstrate the added value your threat intelligence reports provide for your recipients. You don’t just present raw data; you contextualize and interpret it to provide actionable information. I’ll show you some examples in Part 3 of the course.
Let’s Recap!
Processing the collected data is essential to transform raw data into useful information for cybersecurity.
Analyzing threat intelligence results involves summarizing information, identifying trends and risks, and demonstrating the added value for recipients.
It’s vital to present the results in a clear, understandable way, highlighting the actions your organization needs to take to strengthen security.
Now that you have a method for collecting, processing, and analyzing information, let’s see how threat intelligence tools can help you. That’s what we’ll look at in the next chapter. Ready to make a start?
