Event Logging: The Foundation of Security and Compliance

Event logs can be generated from most IT infrastructure including firewalls, Intrusion Detection and Preventions Systems (IDS/IPS), virtual infrastructure, spam filters, servers, Active Directory, wireless networks and more. Capturing, storing, monitoring, alerting and correlating these logs from critical systems is an important step towards safeguarding your sensitive data.
Event logging involves the systematic recording of events that occur within a system or network. This means capturing login attempts, configuration changes, abnormal activity, and system errors. Proper event logging is vital for several reasons:

1. Security: Logs provide a detailed account of activities, making it easier to detect and investigate unauthorized access or suspicious activities. Logs are a critical tool used by security professionals when investigating breaches and should be stored for a sufficient amount of time to provide adequate history for these investigations. And because bad actors may try to cover their tracks by deleting logs, if possible, logs should be stored so they are not immediately available to someone on the production network.
2. Compliance: Regulatory requirements often mandate thorough record-keeping. Logs serve as an audit trail, ensuring that your institution meets standards set by regulatory bodies.
3. Incident Response: In the event of a breach or failure, logs help IT teams quickly identify the root cause and implement corrective actions.

Monitoring and Alerting: Immediate Response to Anomalies While monitoring provides visibility, alerting ensures that IT teams are promptly informed about critical issues. Many midsized organizations outsource the 24x7x365 monitoring to a Managed Detection and Response service (MDR) or Security Operations Center service (SOC) like Neovera/10-D. Effective alerting mechanisms are indispensable for:

1. Timely Intervention: Alerts notify IT personnel of potential threats or failures as they happen, allowing for swift corrective action.
2. Minimizing Downtime: Quick responses to alerts can significantly reduce system downtime, maintaining service availability for customers.
3. Prioritizing Issues: Alerts can be configured to indicate the severity of issues, helping IT teams prioritize their responses effectively.

Correlation: Connecting the Dots Correlation involves analyzing logged events and alerts to identify patterns and understand the broader context of IT incidents. Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) tools are used to collect logs from various types of systems and analyze, correlate and alert. This practice is crucial for:

1. Threat Detection: Correlating data from various sources can reveal complex attack patterns that might go unnoticed if viewed in isolation.
2. Root Cause Analysis: By understanding how different events are related, IT teams can identify the underlying causes of recurring issues.
3. Strategic Decision Making: Correlation provides insights into system behavior and user activity, aiding in strategic planning and resource allocation.

Conclusion Integrating event logging, monitoring, alerting, and correlation into your IT strategy is essential. These practices not only bolster security and compliance but also enhance system performance and customer satisfaction. In an industry where trust and reliability are paramount, investing in these capabilities is a step towards building a resilient and responsive infrastructure.

Authored by: David McCabe, CISSP, MBA