Page 67 - Cyber Defense eMagazine - November 2017

ENHANCE CYBER THREAT HUNTING THROUGH

OPTICAL NETWORK ANALYTICS

CYBER INTELLIGENCE OFFICIALS NEED DATA MINING CAPABILITIES TO
TRACK MALICIOUS ACTIVITY ON GLOBAL TRANSPORT NETWORKS

REQUIRES

by Mike Seidler, Product Marketing Manager, NetQuest Corp.

Global optical transport networks have a little-known secret that keeps cybercriminals up at
night: It’s called analytics. Every time an attack is launched, whether it is theft of Equifax user
data or one of an estimated 4,000 ransomware attacks that occur daily, malicious actors leave a
trail of data that could be used to uncover their activities. Analytics derived from the physical
transport network can be employed to give cyber threat hunters an advantage in collecting this
data.

Cyber intelligence officials often don’t see the data that could identify criminal activity because it
is typically obscured by contemporary monitoring methods that strip away and discard
information that could be used to locate malicious activity.

Additionally, rapid technology changes occurring across long-haul transport networks are
making it more difficult to search for cyber threats. As transmission speeds accelerate and the
volume of traffic expands exponentially, it further impedes efforts to gain real-time visibility
across the all of the pipes that feed into modern optical transport networks.
That could all change as analytics and orchestration take a large role in in network access and
monitoring technology. Providing greater information on where and when attacks occur could
lead to the type of intelligence that turns the table on cyber terrorists.

Modern cyber intelligence applications hunt down aggressors and malicious activity. Successful
solutions should proactively and iteratively search through networks or datasets to discover and
react to advanced threats that evade traditional rule or signature-based security solutions.

This search starts with comprehensive traffic visibility because cyber intelligence agents cannot
find what they cannot see. Trained cyber analysts will rely on automated tools that correlate
information from data collected across multiple platforms to provide actionable intelligence. A
combination of skilled professionals and capable tools provides the necessary backdrop for
successful threat hunting.

67 Cyber Defense eMagazine – November 2017 Edition
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