In-Depth Guide to Managed Security Services in 2024

Data security has developed significantly for the last few years. Businesses now need to implement security services to prevent themselves from cybersecurity attacks, leakages, and frauds.

On the other hand, the pandemic introduced more attacks than before, and in the first 2 month after the beginning of the pandemic, the FBI reported a 300% increase in reported cybercrimes. And 52% of legal and compliance leaders are concerned about third-party cyber risks due to remote work since COVID-19.

To remain one step ahead of hackers, it is vital to follow up with the latest security service technologies and integrate them into your businesses. Managed security services (MSS) allows companies to have state of the art information security without diluting their business focus.

What are Managed Security Services (MSS)?

“Managed security services (MSS) are network security services that have been outsourced to a service provider.” Wikipedia

Managed security services (MSS) are the systematic approach to manage a business’s information security needs. MSS offers a comprehensive set of security options managed by external service providers. These options include 24/7 monitoring, threat detection, security upgrades, assessments, and audits.

Outsourcing saves costs for capital expenditures, provides easier security monitoring and is a simple way to add specific security expertise which the business may lack. This allows the companies to focus on their core business while remaining protected

Why do I need an MSS?

You can take advantage of the expert skills and tools by outsourcing security operations to an MSS vendor. With MSS, you can benefit from what these service providers offer and enhance security without making a large investment. Here is what you can do with MSS:

Increased information security

• Identification of possible threats and responding them immediately
• Monitoring and securing critical business information 24/7
• Avoidance of frauds, loss of intellectual property and leakages of customer data or any classified information
• Easier access to specialized people such as cyber investigators, forensics experts, malware analysts and security data scientists for compliance management

Increased business focus

• Reduced investment cost in security analysis technology to create fund for other capital expenditures or investments. For most firms, this is an Opex/Capex trade-offs. Instead of investing in security capabilities, they rely on vendors that have economies of scale. These vendors of course put a margin on their products. However, in most cases, vendor margins are not high enough to justify investment into these capabilities for firms that are not in Fortune 500.
• Simplification of security management systems and reduce complexities

What does a managed security service provider do?

1. Monitoring: MSS can monitor the whole system and detect critical events throughout your network. These events include unauthorized behavior, malicious hacks, anomalies, and trend analysis. Then, security experts start their response to immediately respond to these threats in real-time.
2. Cyber Defense: MSS performs network forensic analysis to reason any threads. It first discovers a thread while monitoring. It generates the timeline of the attack and identifies the damage. According to that, it rapidly blocks the contagion and exterminates the attack.
3. Vulnerability Assessment: To discover the vulnerabilities of your system, MSS can generate periodical scans and hacking attempts. Minimizing your risk exposure and any damage is the main purpose of these attempts. The results are regularly shared with the client.
4. On-site consulting: MSS also provides consulting services while it assesses business risks, security requirements, policies, and processes. It generates comprehensive security architecture assessments and designs to keep business information safe. Consulting also includes security product integration, on-site emergency responses, and forensic analysis.
5. Security Asset Management: MSS continuously updates your security infrastructure, including network configurations, latest patches, and policies. It provides remediation assistance and consultation service to keep everything up to date.

How should I choose my MSS vendor?

An MSS vendor should be working with leading technology and provide expertise. It needs to identify the risks, satisfy any compliance demands and security goals of your business. While choosing a vendor to address these concerns, you should look at the following aspects:

In-depth security functions

• Extensive vulnerability analysis: Your MSS vendor should provide you security management that includes risks, recommendations, policies, and rules. The MSS vendor should detect, react and report any security threats proactively.
• Integration with other systems: An ideal MSS vendor integrates with product management, development, security operations centers and your technology. Owing to that, your security strategies can evolve with your business’s digital transformation.
• Advanced monitoring system: An MSS vendor shouldn’t only monitor your system. It should include features such as threat intelligence, incident response, and threat hunting. A good MSS vendor would have a full range of customizable services to address your risk, compliance and security needs.
• Vendor response mechanism: As an MSS vendor detects a threat, it should respond to both remote and on-site. This provides non-stop protection and shows the vulnerability of threats to stop similar events.

Taking advantage of today’s technology

• Automation: An MSS vendor should provide an automated security policy, alert handling, and prioritization of threats. It should distinguish between low-level and high-level threats and provide you more time to focus on high-level threats. See our article about the top 7 cybersecurity automation use cases for more details. 
• Mobile app: With a mobile app, you can track and respond immediately to security incidents. You can continuously review the criticality of threats from your phone and to make quick decisions. 
• Cloud security: It is also vital to handle the complexity of all cloud environments. An MSS vendor should monitor and respond to threats against cloud-native applications and offer visibility across hybrid multi-cloud environments.

Considering location-specific factors

• Locally customized service: A strong MSP can consider the local and global facts while securing your business. These facts include local regulations and data privacy requirements across the globe.

For more on cybersecurity technology

To explore different technologies used in cybersecurity today, read our articles on:

• IoT Cybersecurity: Vulnerabilities & Countermeasures
• Ultimate Guide to Ransomware & Best Practices To Avoid Attacks

To invest in an off-the-shelf cybersecurity solution to protect your business, check our data-driven hub of cybersecurity solutions.

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