Security Intelligence

Security intelligence can spell the difference between stopping a cyber attack before it causes any damage and suffering through a devastating data breach. Teams rely on security intelligence sourced online and offline to learn where, when, why, and how bad actors might launch threats—and take preemptive action to fix the vulnerabilities and close the security gaps that attackers intend to exploit. Information and insights give security teams an edge over attackers, making it essential to get as much security intelligence as possible. 

How Does Flare Address Security Intelligence?

How does Flare answer security intelligence needs?

Flare supplies an aspect of security intelligence from one of the most important but inaccessible sources: the dark web. Threat actors congregate in the communities in the dark web to plan attacks, share secrets, and sell information. Flare closely monitors these cybercrime communities, on the “traditional” dark web as well as on Telegram and I2P, and automatically collects analyzes, structures, and contextualizes data into high-value security intelligence tailored to each client. Equipped with actionable threat intelligence about the attacker’s methods, means, and motives, security teams can better prioritize risks and preemptively stop attacks. 

Why is Flare a superior source for security intelligence?

Two issues make it difficult to get security intelligence from the dark web: 

1. scale of the environment
2. level of secrecy

Flare uses automation to overcome both obstacles, searching vast swaths of the dark web while using threat intelligence analytics to give context and clarity to whatever gets discovered. Other methods exist to monitor the dark web, but none offer as much data and detail while requiring as little effort and input as Flare. 

What are the key benefits of the Flare platform?

• Enrich security intelligence with invaluable reconnaissance from the dark web, where many attacks originate. 
• Use rich context, analysis, and tailored data to make smarter security decisions in less time and prevent attacks before they start. 
• Act on prioritized alerts rather than manually parsing through large volumes of information. 

Security Intelligence: The Basics

What is Security Intelligence?

Security intelligence constitutes all the information available about a company’s cyber vulnerabilities and security weaknesses, combined with everything known about external threats and inbound attacks. The dynamic nature of cybersecurity, where new attacks emerge constantly against an ever-expanding attack surface, makes it essential to be monitoring for changes and adapting accordingly. Otherwise, existing security controls will become inadequate. Security intelligence comes from looking inward and outward to learn anything that could help give the defenders an edge.

What are the sources of security intelligence?

It takes input from many sources to get a clear picture of security intelligence: 

• Dark web: Watching cyber crime communities for details about future attacks or overlooked vulnerabilities. Most companies have neither the time nor the experience to monitor the dark web effectively. 
• Open Source: Collecting security intelligence from public sources like blogs, news articles, or social media. Valuable insights can be hiding in plain sight, but it takes persistence to find them among an avalanche of information. 
• In-House: Integrating signals from various internal systems to analyze where weaknesses might exist or threats may be coming from internally. SIEM threat intelligence tools supply much of this security intelligence, but anecdotal and qualitative data plays an important part as well. 
• Professional Communities: Connecting with colleagues in the same industry or with a similar risk profile to share first-hand accounts and information. These connections can be vital but can also be difficult to form and maintain due to secrecy around cybersecurity. 
• Commercial Services: Paying a vendor for threat intelligence and/or actionable information about emerging risks. Not all services are created equal, but the right vendor justifies the cost by supplying better security intelligence more efficiently than would be possible in-house.  

What can security intelligence be used for?

Often the difference-maker in the fight against aggressive attackers, security intelligence helps companies stay as secure as possible. It has many applications:

• Preventing Attacks: Static security tools are vulnerable against emerging and dynamic attacks, but security intelligence provides advanced warning so you can update defenses and controls and cause attacks to fail upon arrival. 
• Stopping Insider Threats: Both devastating and difficult to detect, insider threats often leave clues that security intelligence can find, hopefully early enough to prevent a breach but otherwise to help aid the response, recovery, and investigation. 
• Streamlining Cybersecurity: From helping you find and fix security vulnerabilities to supplying insights for faster, smarter, more confident decision-making, security intelligence helps cybersecurity run more efficiently and effectively, with fewer preventable mistakes and less redundant effort. 
• Staying Compliant: As companies face an increasing number of state, federal, and international cybersecurity requirements, staying compliant takes a proactive effort, driven by security intelligence to help stop attacks and remediate issues early enough to avoid expensive violations. 

Why is Security Intelligence Important Now?

Why does modern cybersecurity depend on security intelligence?

In the past, cybersecurity could run on autopilot to a certain extent. With certain fundamental controls and some basic updates, you could stop most attacks, and fly under the radar of the rest. Not anymore. Companies now face significantly more attacks than before, using increasingly sophisticated tactics. Likewise, every company is a target, no matter the size or industry. When attacks are inevitable and losses are mounting, everyone needs to take cybersecurity seriously and avoid attacks at all costs, which means being more dynamic than before. More than any tool, tactic, or team member, security intelligence helps you stay resilient in a cybersecurity climate where change is constant.   

How does security intelligence elevate cybersecurity?

Many security teams struggle with a lack of resources: time, staff, budget, tools, skills, data, support, etc. Security intelligence helps overcome all these obstacles by giving security teams invaluable insights into their own weak points, helping them go straight to making high-impact fixes and additions. It also provides insight into the adversary’s intentions, shifting power from attackers to defenders to stop new and advanced threats. Put differently, without security intelligence, you must always be reacting to the unknown and unexpected. 

Security Intelligence and Flare

Security intelligence isn’t complete without monitoring external threat exposures. Furthermore, security intelligence isn’t actionable and manageable, or actionable without a solution to help find the critical details in an ocean of information.

Flare provides the leading Threat Exposure Management (TEM) solution for organizations. Our technology constantly scans the online world, including the clear & dark web, to discover unknown events, automatically prioritize risks, and deliver actionable intelligence you can use instantly to improve security. Flare can help your team manage and organize threat intelligence so your organization can better respond to attacks when they happen.
Our solution integrates into your security program in 30 minutes to provide your team with actionable intelligence and automated remediation for high-risk exposure. See it yourself with our free trial.