How Endpoint Detection Works

There are lots of tools, technologies, and services for cyber defense. While most of these have their place within the enterprise security stack, few play a more critical role today than endpoint detection and response solutions.

Over the past few years, endpoint detection and response (EDR) has grown into one of the largest players in the cybersecurity market. It’s estimated that EDR will be a $5.75 billion industry by 2026. Even more impressive is the fact it’s set to grow at a 22.3 percent compound annual growth rate from 2018 to that time.

But what is endpoint detection and response, really? In short, EDR is a breed of cybersecurity tools and services that create more secure endpoints. If you aren’t familiar with the term “endpoint,” these are basically devices that connect to networks. They can come in all kinds of forms. One thing that’s underpinning trends in endpoints, however, is that there are more and more of them connecting to enterprise networks. Furthermore, it can be difficult to verify the security of many, if not most, of these endpoints.

The popularization of using personal devices for work, which has only been amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic, has resulted in an influx of unsecured devices with access to networks. The Internet-of-Things revolution is another factor that’s putting a huge amount of strain on endpoint security. Leveraging EDR tools can vastly reduce the chances of a breach. Let’s look at how endpoint detection works.

How Does Endpoint Detection and Response Work?

Endpoint detection and response is crucial to stopping threats to networks today. But how does endpoint detection work to identify threats? It’s also important to understand how the response aspect of EDR contains them. Here are some of the key elements to how endpoint detection and response works:

• Overarching visibility and logging capabilities – You can’t detect something unless you have the senses for it. Just as a person can’t see the walls in a pitch-black cave, your cybersecurity tools won’t detect threats if they’re not built to do so. A great EDR platform will be able to monitor and show activity at all endpoints. It will also record and log data from devices that connect, regardless of frequency, in order to get a comprehensive view of device behavior.
• The best people are guarding your network – endpoint detection and response solution can either be built internally or purchased as a service through a third-party company. The benefit of going the latter route is that you can rest assured premier security experts will be watching over your endpoints and networks.
• Real-time response – Due to the highly proficient detection capabilities of EDR, it’s possible to react to threats faster than ever. Depending on the type of attack, it will often take weeks, if not months, to identify a threat. The longer it’s allowed to fester on your network, the great the likelihood of it reaching its target.

Endpoint detection and response works through a combination of technology and human intervention. With the optimal combination, it’s possible to contain breaches before they’re able to do lasting damage.

What Are the Benefits of Endpoint Detection and Response?

There’s obvious a reason why so much money is being spent on EDR. If learning how EDR works wasn’t enough to illustrate why it’s a solid choice for enterprises, there are some clear, general benefits as well.

The main goals of building a strong security posture are to secure confidential data (both of the enterprise and its clients), as well as preserving the capital and image of the organization. This all needs to be accomplished within the regulatory framework applicable to the firm’s industry.

Endpoint detection and response is a key element to achieving all these main cybersecurity goals. By adopting EDR for your networks, you’re taking an essential step to building a more secure data ecosystem.