Advanced Incident Response: Coordinating SOC and NOC During Critical Events

Organizations are on alert constantly due to cyber events like ransomware attacks and advanced persistent threats. The digital world is evolving swiftly and brings along new dangers, with cyber threats becoming more unyielding and sophisticated. Responding swiftly to a cyber event can mitigate the crisis or full-blown disruption. This is why incident response is critical: unlocking the secret to dealing with high-impact threats is effectively coordinating Security Operations Center, Network Operations Center, and leveraging managed SOC services.

In this blog, we will discuss the significance of SOC NOC collaboration and the new benchmarks it sets for response planning.

The Role of SOC and NOC in Incident Response

• SOC (Security Operations Center): Focuses on monitoring, detecting, and responding to cybersecurity threats. The SOC is staffed with analysts who specialize in identifying malicious activity and initiating response protocols.

• NOC (Network Operations Center): Manages the health and performance of IT networks. NOC teams are responsible for ensuring uptime, performance monitoring, and resolving network outages or infrastructure failures.

Why Coordination is Critical During a Cyber Incident

This part response plan to a cyber incident needs both SOC and NOC working together. Organizations too often place SOC and NOC teams in silos, viewing cybersecurity and network performance as two distinct silos. Such division tends to miss certain umbra signals or take longer to respond, resulting in deeper issues during incidents.

1. Faster Threat Containment:

During a breach, SOC may detect unusual traffic patterns or suspicious user behavior. NOC can quickly assist by isolating affected segments or rerouting traffic to contain the threat, significantly reducing damage.

2. Improved Communication:

Incidents can escalate quickly. Having pre-established communication protocols between SOC and NOC ensures that the right information is passed efficiently and action can be taken in real time.

3. Decreased downtime 

High-resiliency SOC have procedures in place for changing processes to remediate certain elements of an process or processes approach system level.

4. Root Cause Analysis:

Analyzing the aftermath of any incident can be far more useful when the security and forensics teams work together with other departments like the NOC, who evaluate systems and monitor their failures and successes, as each part contributes to revealing what actually went wrong.

Creating a Cohesive Responding Framework for Incidents

Any organization attempting to manage incidents successfully has to start by redesigning how its SOC and NOC teams physically function. They should not be seen as autonomous silos but rather as distinct collaborative entities that share common goals. To achieve this, follow the outline below,

1. Standard Operating Procedures for Response

Create templates of procedures that describe how SOC and NOC teams should interact with each other for various types of incidents. Include steps for escalation, commonly used language, and different roles to be performed as well as imagined scenarios including DDoS, insider threat, and even malware outbreaks.

2. Joint Exercises and Training Sessions

Develop training programs that are attended by personnel from both SOC and NOC. Cyber-even simulated events known as tabletop exercises or red team drills should incorporate response plans that address all aspects that may come up requiring different functional responsibilities from both teams.

3. Common Dashboards and Tools:

Use advanced systems which are access controlled, allow for the real time sharing of intelligence regarding threats, and even the status of all systems and the networks in use. This way, they are ensured the same information thus enabling prompt rational decision making without unnecessary venues being pursued.

4. Cross Team Liaisons

Create liaison positions or train analysts who will serve as a bridge between SOC and NOC. These people have dual roles; they know both security and infrastructure, and therefore serve as talking heads during incidents.

Case Example: Coordinated Response In Action

Imagine this plausible scenario:

An online retail company is undergoing what seems like a DDoS attack. SOC notices abnormal traffic targeting log-in APIs. At the same time, NOC observes latency and strain across services.

Uncoordinated, the NOC might treat this as a performance degradation issue. SOC might remain stuck in the belief of detection only. In a SOC and NOC coordinated approach, their inter-team response is instantaneous.

• In the first scenario SOC confirms bot traffic, while NOC reroutes assumed traffic.
• Health alerts are disabled prior to reroute depending on authorisation. Communication takes place between the systems while business users are maintained in the loop.

What’s the end result? They manage to contain the threat in several minutes, the downtime is next to none and the customer stays happy and trusting.

Fundamental Components of Cyber Incident Response Planning

Particular foundational elements are vital for effective cyber response planning, particularly when SOC and NOC integration is part of the plan.

1. Incident Classification Matrix

In this matrix, define what a low, medium, or high-severity incident is. SOC and NOC can synchronize their movements with this matrix, as well as understand the obstructions in every case.

2. Communication Hierarchy

Define who can talk to whom during the event. Create internal update (from SOC to NOC) and external (to customers, stakeholders, regulators) update channels.

3. Documentation and Playbooks

For every incident, action checklists, escalation steps, logging requirements, and after action review, along with any other pertinent information should be included in a playbook.

4. Post-Incident Reviews

Conduct a joint review after a significant event has occurred with SOC, NOC and IT leadership. Analyze what was done well and what can be improved upon for improved collaboration in future responses.

Overcoming Common Challenges

Organizations trying to force alignment on their SOC and NOC teams encounter these problems.

• Cultural Differences: Foster team building initiatives around shared objectives. This will ease the divisions between security and network teams and improve collaboration.
• Tool Incompatibility: Improve information sharing by investing in integration tools or centralized platforms to disparate systems and dashboards.
• Information Silos: Data hoarding or restricted access can derail response efforts. Encourage transparency and sharing of data across departments.

Final Thoughts: Advancing the Incident Response Through Team Synergy

Today, the problem is not only how to stop the bad guys but doing so in a coordinated way that minimizes disruption to the business. That SOC and NOC alignment is lower bound.

Organizations can enhance their response to cyber incidents by developing integrated frameworks, conducting regular joint exercises, and establishing continuous communication.