Best 10 MDR Solutions For Enterprise (2026)
We reviewed 10 MDR providers on SLA commitments, analyst response quality, and what their platforms do versus what their teams do. The split matters more than vendors admit.
Written by
Joel Witts
Technical Review by
Craig MacAlpine
Quick Summary
Managed Detection and Response (MDR) services provide 24/7 threat monitoring and active response through a combination of technology and human analysts — designed for organizations that cannot staff a full security operations center. MDR is only worth the investment if response times and analyst quality match the vendor’s promises. We reviewed 10 providers and found ESET PROTECT MDR, RocketCyber, and ThreatLocker® Cyber Hero Managed Detection and Response to be the strongest on analyst quality and genuine response capability.
Your security team cannot watch everything, all the time. Attackers know it. Managed detection and response fills that gap, but the market is crowded with services that look similar on paper and perform very differently when an incident is live. The wrong MDR service means slow response times, high false positive rates, and an analyst team that triages noise while real threats advance.
We evaluated ten MDR platforms for detection coverage, response speed, analyst quality, transparency, and whether the service model matches the environments it claims to protect. What we found: the gap between “24/7 monitoring” and “24/7 monitoring that actually stops attacks” is significant. Some services deliver elite threat hunting but require security maturity to operate effectively. Others prioritize simplicity and get SMBs protected fast, but hit ceilings as environments grow.
This guide cuts through the noise to show you which platforms deliver when an attacker is inside your environment, and which ones are better suited to a different use case than yours.
ESET is one of the world’s best known cybersecurity providers, supporting over a billion users worldwide across more than 200 countries. ESET PROTECT MDR is their fully managed cybersecurity solution for small to mid-sized enterprises, combining endpoint security, file server security, extended endpoint detection and response (XDR), and premium support from ESET’s expert global team. We think ESET PROTECT MDR is a strong option for mid-market teams that need multilayered protection with managed detection and response under one contract.
ESET PROTECT MDR Key Features
ESET PROTECT MDR includes ESET’s market-leading endpoint protection, which leverages machine learning technologies and crowdsourced threat intelligence to provide effective protection against malware and ransomware attacks. The endpoint detection and response solution includes extended endpoint controls and visibility, with threat hunting designed to catch never-before-seen zero-day threats. Other key features include file server security, full disk encryption, and proactive threat hunting and monitoring.
Users can leverage ESET’s premium support service, which operates worldwide and is available 24/7/365. ESET’s technical support team can help troubleshoot issues, manage security risks, and resolve management or deployment issues. The platform is available for all major PC, Mac, and smartphone operating systems and can be deployed in the cloud or on-premises.
Our Take
We think ESET PROTECT MDR is a strong fit for small to mid-sized enterprises looking for an all-in-one endpoint protection, detection, and response solution backed by a premium support offering. Users highly rate this service, highlighting the powerful continuous protection and high-quality support available. The multilayered approach, with endpoint protection, XDR, and managed response wrapped into a single platform, keeps your stack consolidated.
Strengths
- Multilayered protection combining endpoint security, XDR, and managed response
- 24/7/365 premium support with global availability
- Full disk encryption included in the package
- Cloud and on-premises deployment options
- Cross-platform coverage for PC, Mac, and smartphone
Cautions
- Pricing not publicly available; requires contacting ESET for a quote
RocketCyber, a Kaseya company, offers a managed Security Operations Center (SOC) service providing 24/7 threat monitoring and response across endpoints, networks, and cloud environments. The solution is designed for MSPs to offer reliable MDR to SMB clients.
RocketCyber Key Features
The RocketCyber platform is operated by a team of cybersecurity experts who work with your team to hunt for threats and investigate potential vulnerabilities. The platform offers a built-in app store with purpose-built detection apps, including breach detection, threat hunting, and event log monitoring. RocketCyber uses 17 hunt test methodologies to detect advanced threats and performs real-time monitoring of Windows, macOS, and Linux security events, firewall and network device events, and Office 365 and Azure AD cloud events. Detections are aligned with the MITRE ATT&CK framework to create a forensic timeline.
Our Take
RocketCyber is a strong MDR solution for MSPs serving SMB clients. We were impressed by the extensive threat hunting capabilities and the built-in app store approach, which lets organizations enable the specific detection apps they need. The platform doesn’t require additional hardware, and detected threats are fed directly into existing MSP ticketing systems with remediation advice. It also integrates with Kaseya, Autotask, ConnectWise, Syncro, and existing malware protection tools.
Strengths
- 24/7 managed SOC with threat hunting and investigation
- 17 hunt test methodologies for advanced threat detection
- MITRE ATT&CK framework alignment
- Built-in app store with purpose-built detection apps
Cautions
- Pricing not publicly available; requires contacting RocketCyber for a quote
ThreatLocker Cyber Hero MDR provides 24/7/365 managed threat detection and response services, led by the ThreatLocker team of experts. It helps organizations keep on top of alerts and can significantly improve detection and response times for potential cyber threats. Cyber Hero MDR is an add-on service to the ThreatLocker Detect EDR solution, and we were impressed by the average response time of less than 60 seconds.
ThreatLocker Cyber Hero MDR Key Features
Cyber Hero MDR works by leveraging telemetry data from all agents of the ThreatLocker Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform and Windows event logs to recognize and address harmful activities on devices. The system automatically sends alerts when it detects unusual behavior, including detailed threat data. The Cyber Hero team analyzes these alerts to determine if it’s a genuine Indicator of Compromise (IoC) or a false positive. If the IoC is genuine, the Cyber Hero team follows a pre-set rulebook, agreed with your team, to isolate and lock down the device.
The Cyber Hero team notifies you of the issue and provides additional context on the risk, how the compromise occurred, where the threat came from, how it was found, and the remediation activities undertaken. ThreatLocker Detect can identify a variety of potential threats, such as unusual network traffic or repeated failed login attempts, and can automatically take response actions such as enforcing rules, detaching endpoints from the network, or activating lockdown mode. All responses are governed by incident response policies established via the admin console, and policies can be adjusted to manage the severity threshold that triggers an alert.
Our Take
The ThreatLocker Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform underneath Cyber Hero MDR provides application, network, and storage controls, enabling admins to control user-installed apps, lock down applications to mitigate ransomware spread, and facilitate dynamic Zero Trust network controls. We think Cyber Hero MDR is a strong option for organizations already running ThreatLocker Detect that want 24/7 expert monitoring with a sub-60-second response time. The customizable runbook approach means your team controls how incidents are handled without leaving everything to automation.
Strengths
- Average response time under 60 seconds
- Customizable incident runbooks agreed with your team before deployment
- Full context provided on each incident including origin, risk, and remediation
- Tight integration with ThreatLocker Zero Trust platform avoids additional agents
Cautions
- Pricing requires a custom quote; no publicly listed plans
Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response (MDR)
Arctic Wolf MDR is a 24/7 managed service that goes beyond standard alert triage with its Concierge Security Team model. We think this sets it apart from most MDR providers, which stop at detection and response.
Arctic Wolf MDR Key Features
The Concierge Security Team reviews your environment, surfaces security gaps, and recommends improvements alongside continuous threat monitoring across networks, endpoints, and cloud. Arctic Wolf integrates with your existing technology stack to build a unified view of your assets. AI assistance supports SOC analysts in processing telemetry, and customizable workflows let you shape incident response to fit your risk tolerance.
What Customers Say
Customers consistently praise the team as responsive, accessible, and engaged. Based on customer reviews, the a la carte pricing model is a growing concern, with new features outside the core bundle pushing total cost upward. Users have also flagged limited custom log parser flexibility as a recurring pain point when connecting non-standard data sources.
Our Take
We think Arctic Wolf fits teams that need MDR as a genuine extension of their security function, not just alert monitoring. The Concierge model delivers strategic depth that most managed services skip. Just watch the total cost of ownership as your feature needs expand.
Strengths
- Concierge Security Team provides strategic guidance beyond alert triage
- 24/7 monitoring spans networks, endpoints, and cloud
- Integrates with existing stacks without new infrastructure
Cautions
- New features fall outside the core bundle, pushing cost upward
- Reviews flag limited custom log parser support
CrowdStrike Falcon Complete
CrowdStrike Falcon Complete, now branded as Falcon Complete Next-Gen MDR, combines enterprise endpoint security with a fully managed service layer and the OverWatch threat hunting team. We think this is one of the strongest MDR options on the market for organizations with the security maturity to operate a platform this capable. CrowdStrike reports a mean time to detect of four minutes.
CrowdStrike Falcon Complete Key Features
OverWatch provides continuous threat hunting across endpoint, identity, cloud, and Next-Gen SIEM data, going well beyond standard alert monitoring. The platform deploys in minutes via a lightweight agent and connects to existing tools through APIs. CrowdStrike’s SOC analysts can isolate hosts, kill processes, and remove malicious files using delegated authority within agreed scope.
What Customers Say
Customers consistently praise the lightweight agent and behavioral detection capabilities, reporting no impact on system performance. Some customer reviews note that the admin portal is built for experienced engineers, and third-party integrations take time to configure correctly. Pricing is the most frequently flagged concern, particularly when additional modules push costs up.
Our Take
We think Falcon Complete fits organizations with the security maturity to fully leverage the platform. The OverWatch team adds a dedicated threat hunting layer that most MDR services can’t match. If your security operations are still maturing, the complexity and cost demand careful evaluation.
Strengths
- OverWatch hunts continuously across endpoint, identity, cloud, and SIEM data
- Four-minute mean time to detect with delegated containment authority
- Lightweight agent deploys in minutes with no performance impact
Cautions
- Pricing is high, especially with additional modules
- Customers note a steep learning curve on the admin portal
Expel Managed Detection and Response
Expel MDR covers cloud, Kubernetes, endpoints, SaaS, email, network, and identity from a single platform with 130+ native integrations. We were impressed by the transparency of the Expel Workbench, which gives your team direct visibility into how every alert is triaged, enriched, and investigated. That level of SOC transparency is a genuine differentiator in this market.
Expel MDR Key Features
Expel Workbench shows your team exactly what the analysts see in real time, from initial alert to investigation to resolution. AI and automation handle detection, correlation, and prioritization before human analysts step in, and Expel reports a 14-minute critical alert MTTR with auto-remediation enabled. Analysts also proactively surface configuration gaps, logging blind spots, and detection tuning opportunities.
What Customers Say
Customers consistently describe Expel as feeling like an extension of their internal security team, freeing up internal resources from L1 triage. According to customer feedback, integration depth varies by tool, with some data sources delivering rich context and others feeling limited. Self-service tuning options are a recurring frustration for teams with custom detection needs.
Our Take
We think Expel suits security teams that want operational transparency alongside managed coverage. If your team needs to stay close to investigations rather than hand everything off, the Workbench model is a strong fit. Onboarding is fast too, with Expel reporting that environments can be ingesting signals within seven minutes.
Strengths
- Workbench gives full visibility into alert triage and investigations
- 130+ native integrations across cloud, SaaS, email, endpoints, and identity
- 14-minute critical alert MTTR with auto-remediation
Cautions
- Self-service tuning options are limited
- Reviews note integration depth varies by tool
Huntress
Huntress is a managed detection and response platform built for small and mid-sized businesses, specifically targeting persistent foothold attacks and ransomware. We think this is the strongest MDR option for SMBs under 1,000 users that need ransomware defense without dedicated security staff. The one-click remediation model reduces the expertise barrier significantly.
Huntress Key Features
Huntress deploys ransomware canary files across all protected endpoints. If those files are modified, an investigation opens immediately with the SOC team to confirm whether the changes are the result of a ransomware infection. One-click remediation with step-by-step guidance lets IT teams handle incidents directly without deep security expertise, and 24/7 human threat hunting runs in the background without requiring internal SOC coverage.
What Customers Say
Customers highlight fast setup and a dashboard that requires no specialist training. Remediation workflows with tailored assessments and clear next steps get consistent praise. Some users report that post-isolation response times have slowed as Huntress has grown, with gaps of 15 to 30 minutes between isolation events and receiving actionable details.
Our Take
We think Huntress is the go-to MDR for SMBs in the core use case. Ransomware canary detection, one-click remediation, and clear incident guidance deliver strong coverage without added complexity. If your environment has grown past 1,000 users, assess whether the additional modules justify their cost.
Strengths
- Ransomware canary files enable earlier detection
- One-click remediation with step-by-step guidance
- 24/7 human threat hunting without requiring internal SOC
Cautions
- Users report post-isolation response times of 15-30 minutes
- Admin console lacks granular sub-team permissions
Rapid7 Managed Detection and Response Services
Rapid7 MDR provides multi-layer detection across endpoints, network traffic, user behavior, and deception technology in a single managed service. We found the deception technology layer is a distinctive addition that most MDR services don’t include, creating internal traps that catch malicious behavior before attackers reach high-value targets.
Rapid7 MDR Key Features
Rapid7 analyzes user behavior and attacker behavior separately, building baselines of healthy activity to surface anomalies early. Centralized log management, file integrity monitoring, and network traffic analysis feed into the SOC alongside endpoint detection, giving analysts fuller context during investigations. In January 2026, Rapid7 also launched MDR for Microsoft, a specialized offering for organizations running Microsoft Defender.
What Customers Say
Customers describe Rapid7 MDR as functioning like a genuine team extension, with analysts handling triage and delivering clear action steps. Based on customer reviews, the onboarding process ran slower than expected for some deployments, and alert ordering issues in the portal can make incident prioritization harder under time pressure.
Our Take
We think Rapid7 MDR fits organizations that need detection depth across more than just endpoints. If network traffic monitoring and deception technology matter for your environment alongside endpoint coverage, this is a strong option. For buyers focused purely on endpoint MDR, simpler options offer a cleaner fit.
Strengths
- Deception technology traps catch malicious behavior before it reaches targets
- Dual behavior analytics cover user and attacker activity separately
- Centralized log management and file integrity monitoring included
Cautions
- Customers note onboarding ran longer than expected
- Alert ordering issues make prioritization harder under pressure
Red Canary (A Zscaler Company)
Red Canary, acquired by Zscaler in August 2025, delivers 24/7 threat detection and response across endpoints, identities, and cloud environments. We think the standout here is alert fidelity: Red Canary reports a 99.6% accuracy rate backed by multi-expert validation before alerts reach your team. If your team has been burned by high false positive rates, this changes the signal-to-noise ratio at the source.
Red Canary Key Features
Red Canary runs over 4,000 behavioral analytics continuously, layered with automated and ad-hoc threat hunts. Alerts only reach your team after multiple analysts confirm them, which is a genuine differentiator in a market where most services push every alert downstream. Guided remediation playbooks walk teams through response steps, and transparent reporting tracks threats stopped over time.
What Customers Say
Customers consistently highlight high-fidelity detections and a reduction in false positives compared to previous solutions. Onboarding gets consistent praise, with customers reporting immediate value once their environment was configured. Some customer reviews note that email-based alert communication creates confusion when managing multiple concurrent incidents.
Our Take
We think Red Canary suits organizations that need confirmed-threat-only alerting. The validated alert model means your team acts on real threats, not noise. The Zscaler acquisition is worth tracking for long-term roadmap and integration direction, particularly if you’re already in the Zscaler ecosystem.
Strengths
- 99.6% accuracy rate with multi-expert alert validation
- Over 4,000 behavioral analytics with automated threat hunts
- Fast onboarding with immediate security value
Cautions
- Customization options are limited
- Reviews flag email-based alerts cause confusion during concurrent incidents
SentinelOne Vigilance Respond MDR
SentinelOne Vigilance Respond is an MDR service built on the Singularity XDR platform, with a mean time to respond of 18 minutes delivered by a dedicated in-house expert team. We found the tight integration between the managed service and the XDR platform gives analysts richer context faster. SentinelOne has begun rebranding this service as Wayfinder MDR, though the core offering remains the same.
SentinelOne Vigilance Respond Key Features
Vigilance Respond combines active threat hunting with automated incident response on SentinelOne’s AI-based endpoint detection engine. The Pro tier adds digital forensics and malware investigation on top of standard triage and remediation guidance. Deployment is straightforward for organizations already running SentinelOne endpoints, with minimal additional overhead.
What Customers Say
Customers consistently say Vigilance frees up internal resources, with users praising it as a cost-effective alternative to hiring dedicated security staff. Some users report that response consistency varies across incidents and doesn’t always match the headline 18-minute MTTR. Exclusions are hash-based only, with no application-level option available.
Our Take
We think Vigilance Respond is the most natural fit for organizations already running SentinelOne endpoint protection. The managed layer sits directly on the XDR engine your team already knows. Without an existing SentinelOne deployment, weigh the platform dependency against the coverage benefits.
Strengths
- 18-minute MTTR from a dedicated in-house expert team
- Active threat hunting integrates directly with Singularity XDR
- Pro tier adds digital forensics and malware investigation
Cautions
- Users report response consistency varies across incidents
- Exclusions limited to hash-based rules only
Other Endpoint Security Services
Integrated MDR with AI-driven threat detection and response across endpoints and cloud.
24/7 threat hunting, detection, and response backed by global security experts.
Expert-driven MDR with advanced threat intelligence and incident response.
Cloud-native MDR offering continuous threat detection and compliance support.
Cross-layer detection combining endpoint, email, and network data.
Managed threat detection and response with 24/7 SOC and global coverage.
How We Compared The Best Managed Detection And Response Solutions
Expert Insights is an independent editorial team that researches, tests, and reviews cybersecurity and IT solutions. No vendor can pay to influence our review of their products. Our Editor’s Scores are based solely on product quality. Before testing, we map the full vendor market for each category, identifying all active vendors from market leaders to emerging challengers.
We evaluated ten MDR platforms for detection coverage, response speed, analyst quality, transparency, service model fit, and how well each platform handles the environments it claims to protect. Each product was assessed through hands-on evaluation of detection workflows, dashboard navigation, and incident response processes, alongside pricing model clarity.
Beyond hands-on evaluation, we conducted in-depth market research across the MDR category and reviewed customer feedback, implementation guides, and incident response documentation to understand how platforms perform when an attacker is active in your environment. We spoke with vendors to understand service architecture, analyst team structure, and licensing models. Our editorial and commercial teams operate independently. No vendor can pay to influence our review of their products.
This guide is updated quarterly. For full details on our evaluation process, visit our How We Test & Review Products page.
What To Look For: Managed Detection And Response Solutions Checklist
Evaluating MDR services requires looking beyond coverage claims to ask the right questions about how detection and response actually works when an incident is live. Here’s what actually matters:
Response Time And What It Actually Means: What is the vendor’s mean time to respond, and what does “respond” mean in their definition? Some services measure time to alert acknowledgment. Others measure time to containment action. Ask for the specific SLA, what triggers the clock, and what your team receives at the end of it.
Alert Fidelity And False Positive Rate: How does the service validate alerts before they reach your team? High false positive rates consume internal resources and erode trust in the service over time. Ask how many alerts are validated by human analysts before notification, and what the vendor’s published true positive rate is.
Analyst Quality And Availability: Who is doing the detection work? Some services use tiered offshore SOC models with variable expertise levels. Others use in-house teams with dedicated threat hunters. Ask whether analysts are in-house or outsourced, what their escalation process looks like, and whether you get a named point of contact.
Coverage Scope And Telemetry Depth: Does the service monitor endpoints only, or does it extend to cloud, network, identity, SaaS, and email? Attackers move laterally across the environment. A service that only sees endpoint telemetry misses significant portions of a modern attack chain.
Transparency And Visibility Into Investigations: Can you see how your MDR service is working? Some platforms give full visibility into alert triage, investigation steps, and analyst decisions. Others operate as black boxes where you receive notifications without context. Your team needs enough visibility to learn from incidents, not just close them.
Integration With Your Existing Stack: How does the service connect to the tools you already run? Some MDR services build on a specific platform and deliver limited value outside that ecosystem. Others integrate broadly across EDR, SIEM, and identity tools. Map your existing stack before evaluating integration claims.
Remediation Model And Your Team’s Role: Does the service contain and remediate automatically, or does it hand off action items to your team? Fully automated response reduces dwell time but can disrupt production systems. Guided remediation gives your team control but requires internal bandwidth. Know which model fits your risk tolerance and operational capacity.
Pricing Model And Total Cost Of Ownership: What does the base service cover, and what sits behind additional fees? Some MDR services start competitive and escalate quickly as you add coverage modules, data sources, or faster response tiers. Get a full cost projection for your environment before you compare headline prices.
Test your incident response process before you need it. Run a tabletop exercise with your MDR vendor to validate response times, communication workflows, and remediation steps under simulated pressure before an attacker does it for real.
The Bottom Line
No single MDR service fits every organization. Your choice depends on team size, existing security tooling, detection coverage requirements, and how much internal bandwidth your team can contribute to the service relationship.
If your team is mid-market and stretched across a growing environment without dedicated SOC coverage, ESET PROTECT MDR wraps endpoint protection, XDR, and threat hunting in a single managed contract that handles what your team can’t.
If you are an MSP managing security across multiple client environments from a single console, RocketCyber delivers real-time monitoring across endpoints, cloud, network, and firewall events with direct ticketing integration and MITRE ATT&CK-aligned detections.
If your organization already runs ThreatLocker’s Zero Trust platform and wants 24/7 expert monitoring on top, ThreatLocker CyberHero MDR delivers sub-60-second response times with customizable incident rulebooks built directly on your existing telemetry.
If you need MDR that functions as a genuine security team extension with strategic guidance beyond alert triage, Arctic Wolf MDR delivers continuous monitoring across networks, endpoints, and cloud alongside a Concierge Security Team that surfaces gaps and recommends improvements.
If your organization has the security maturity to operate an enterprise-grade platform and needs elite threat hunting on top of AI-driven detection, CrowdStrike Falcon Complete delivers OverWatch continuous threat hunting with a centralized triage dashboard that scales across complex environments.
If your security team wants full operational visibility into how every alert is investigated and triaged, Expel MDR delivers Workbench transparency across cloud, Kubernetes, SaaS, email, endpoints, network, and identity from a single platform.
If you are an SMB under 1,000 users that needs ransomware defense without dedicated security staff, Huntress delivers ransomware canary detection, one-click remediation, and 24/7 human threat hunting without requiring specialist expertise to operate.
If your environment needs detection depth across endpoints, network traffic, user behavior, and deception technology in a single managed service, Rapid7 MDR delivers dual behavior analytics and internal deception traps alongside centralized log management and file integrity monitoring.
If your team has been burned by high false positive rates and needs confirmed-threat-only alerting, Red Canary MDR delivers a 99% true positive rate backed by multi-expert validation and over 4,000 behavioral analytics running continuously across your environment.
If your organization already runs SentinelOne endpoint protection and wants managed coverage built directly on that investment, SentinelOne Vigilance Respond delivers active threat hunting and automated incident response on the Singularity XDR engine with an 18-minute MTTR and optional digital forensics for deeper investigations.
Read the individual reviews above to dig into detection coverage, response models, and pricing that matters for your environment.
FAQs
Everything You Need To Know About Managed Detection and Response (FAQs)
Managed detection and response (MDR) are outsourced, specialized cybersecurity services, which use combination of machine learning, artificial intelligence, edge computing, and human intelligence to discover and remediate against cyber-threats. MDR services connect organizations to highly trained IT staff who can help to monitor, analyze, and respond to incidents and anomalies in their network.
The best MDR providers implement a wide range of advanced tools as well as offer highly skilled and trained staff to be able to monitor, detect, prioritize, investigate, and remediate threats appropriately and effectively. They utilize artificial intelligence and machine learning tools to automate network scanning and threat detection, and to reduce the overall number of alerts. The human side of MDR consists of threat hunters, data analysts, security analysts, and more to provide specialized insight and problem–solving expertise, to help analyze threats and implement the most efficient, effective incident response workflows.
A Managed Detection And Response (MDR) solution gives you comprehensive threat detection and remediation capabilities, managed for your organization by a team of security experts. When choosing an MDR solution to partner with, there are some key features to consider:
- Threat hunting and alert prioritization
- Information analysis, triage, and reporting
- Automatic, facilitated, and managed remediation options
- 24/7 Support team on-hand
- Vulnerability insights
The main reason for deploying an MDR solution is to quickly identify and remove network threats. Because of this, threat hunting, alerting, information triage, and managed threat remediation is extremely important. Choosing an MDR is also about finding the right partner for your business, so it’s also important to consider the credibility of the managed service, your organization’s specific requirements and scale, and of course the cost of the MDR solution.
Threat Hunting: Perhaps the most crucial task completed by MDR services is threat hunting. MDR services proactively seek out potential and emerging known and unknown threats. They aggregate activity data from a wide variety of sources—such as logs, events, endpoints, and user behavior—and analyze that data for vulnerabilities and indicators of active threats. This continuous, extensive approach to threat hunting makes MDR particularly adept in finding advanced and sophisticated threats, such as zero-day malware.
The round-the-clock threat hunting also helps for threats to be discovered and responded to far quicker, meaning the issue can be solved much faster, thereby reducing its overall impact. MDR solutions can also perform dark web monitoring, target- and risk-based threat hunting, Digital Asset Monitoring, and domain registration monitoring.
Data Collection: In order for MDR services to stay one step ahead of the curve, they need to aggregate a lot of data from a wealth of sources to provide detailed forensics about all threats–both new and old. MDR services collect data from assets, user behavior, events, files, logs, endpoints, and any other network activity. They also consult heavily with shared lists on known and emerging threats, and often will regularly trawl the dark and deep web to detect if company information is being misused at any point. This data collection isn’t just stored and left, however; MDR staff also use it for research.
Threat Intelligence: For MDR teams to be able to respond to threats as appropriately and as quickly as possible, they rely heavily on threat intelligence. Threat intelligence pertains to the data that is collected, processed, and analyzed to learn and understand a particular attacker’s target, motive, behavior, and patterns of attack. This information is analyzed to help SOC and MDR teams further understand how threat actors operate, helping them in turn to make quicker and more informed responses to (and anticipate) threats and develop prevention strategies.
Incident Analysis: MDR solutions provide companies with access to a team of experts who meticulously research incidents as they occur, allowing for them to prioritize threats and assess what the best course of action is to respond to an attack and devise guided responses.
Incident Response: And of course, it’s no good just to have a highly skilled and full kitted out team to just deliver extensive reporting and analysis. MDR services also provide incident response, either through immediate automated response from tools that nip emerging threats in the bud or through a team analyzing and remediating more sophisticated threats that need a pair of human eyes on them. The organization experiencing the breach will be notified and supplied with a root cause analysis and remediation recommendations and toolkits to solve the problem, with some MDR services actually remediating the breaches themselves.
Generally, the quicker the responses to incidents, the greater the reduction in the overall impact a threat can have on a network.
Security Monitoring: MDR services, in addition to threat hunting and responding to said threats, can also be proactive in the actual prevention of attacks. They offer vulnerability management, pointing out to organizations where security may be lacking and offering solutions to patch these oversights. They, of course, also perform dedicated, constant security monitoring of an organization’s network perimeter, network activity, endpoints, and more.
The tools, staff, and capabilities that make up the framework may vary between solutions, but there are some critical features that you need to look out for when choosing an MDR provider:
Adaptability: Good MDR services tend to not overcomplicate things. Rather than tearing out your security architecture and building something from scratch, MDR services tend to make things more manageable by building on what you already have. If appropriate solutions aren’t in place, then MDR services can help you to devise and build your security framework. Most MDR services also have a range of deployment options, covering on-prem, cloud, hybrid, and public environments.
Visibility: Coverage and insights into network activity need to be not only in depth but wide reaching, leaving no stone unturned. MDR services should be applied to every single part of the network, regardless of whether it’s cloud to on-prem, from behind a data center to every single endpoint.
MDR solutions pull data and analytics from every reach of the network and all their threat intelligence from a variety of sources. Good MDR services should provide organizations all of this within a single, intuitive, and clean dashboard that is easy to navigate and understand.
Round-The-Clock Monitoring: Attacks come from all angles and at all hours. MDR revolves around constant detection, investigation, and response. Cyberthreats don’t sleep and neither do MDR services; MDR provides 24/7/365 analysis and response, making sure that organizations are protected at all times. This round-the-clock support is delivered by robust, automated tools that actively hunt for threats and remediate them where they can when no human input is necessary, and a team that covers all hours of the day.
Alongside these benefits, MDR services also bring valuable insights and extensive reporting to the table that wouldn’t necessarily be available from just automated reports or from an in-house team. They can also help devise custom responses to incidents, ensuring a more targeted and effective approach to remediation.
Written By
Joel is the Director of Content and a co-founder at Expert Insights; a rapidly growing media company focussed on covering cybersecurity solutions.
He’s an experienced journalist and editor with 8 years’ experience covering the cybersecurity space. He’s reviewed hundreds of cybersecurity solutions, interviewed hundreds of industry experts and produced dozens of industry reports read by thousands of CISOs and security professionals in topics like IAM, MFA, zero trust, email security, DevSecOps and more.
He also hosts the Expert Insights Podcast and co-writes the weekly newsletter, Decrypted. Joel is driven to share his team’s expertise with cybersecurity leaders to help them create more secure business foundations.
Technical Review
Craig MacAlpine is CEO and Founder of Expert Insights. Before founding Expert Insights in August 2018, Craig spent 10 years as CEO of EPA Cloud, an email security provider that rebranded as VIPRE Email Security following its acquisition by Ziff Davis, formerly J2Global (NASDAQ: ZD) in 2013.
Craig is a passionate security innovator with over 20 years of experience helping organizations to stay secure with cutting-edge information security and cybersecurity solutions.
Using his extensive experience in the email security industry, he founded Expert Insights with the singular goal of helping IT professionals and CISOs to cut through the noise and find the right cybersecurity solutions they need to protect their organizations.