The misconception that “we’re too small to be a target” is becoming less common these days. The numerous supply-chain attacks in recent years have shown that you don’t have to be the attackers’ ultimate target to face a sophisticated attack — all it takes is to have a major client or partner, or simply a broad customer base. That’s why many small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs) have long since adopted EDR solutions. Fortunately, the market offers modern EDR products that are accessible even to small companies and which aren’t particularly difficult to manage.

But is EDR functionality enough for your needs — or is it time to start considering XDR? To answer that, you need to ask yourself four more questions.

Is your cybersecurity team coping with the volume of alerts?

Any cybersecurity employee using an EDR console has to process an enormous number of endpoint alerts. A single incident can trigger hundreds of similar alerts; for example, when the same malicious file is detected on a hundred different endpoints. Each of these alerts consumes the time and attention of the cybersecurity specialist. This repetitive, exhausting work is a major cause of security team burnout.

With Kaspersky Next XDR Optimum, related alerts are grouped together, allowing operators to instantly see a more complete picture of the incident. Response actions can also be applied to all similar alerts with a single click instead of handling them one by one. This reduces the team’s workload and significantly cuts incident response time.

Do your experts have enough time to investigate incidents?

Let’s say your EDR solution detects malicious activity on one of your workstations. The logical response for an EDR operator is to isolate the device and thoroughly investigate it. But this takes time, and given a serious incident, time is the one thing you don’t have. First, it may not be immediately clear at what stage the attack was detected. The attackers may have already gained access to other endpoints. Second, a huge number of today’s attacks take place because of compromised corporate credentials. The operator can’t know whether an employee inadvertently opened a malicious email attachment — or whether an outsider logged in as that employee to attack the infrastructure. And if it’s the latter, they may try to gain access with the same username and password somewhere else.

Next XDR Optimum allows you to block users directly in Active Directory right from the alert card. This helps contain the attack, limit potential damage, and buy valuable time for a more thorough investigation.

Does your cybersecurity team have enough context when responding to threats?

An EDR alert tells the operator that a malicious file has been detected on a workstation so that they can start taking defensive actions. But sometimes that’s not enough. A malicious file might be just one part of a larger attack that would require a deeper investigation to detect and counter.

Next XDR Optimum gives operators access to the Kaspersky Cloud Sandbox, where suspicious files can be uploaded to an isolated cloud environment and safely analyzed to see what they actually do. The system helps create an indicator of compromise — allowing for a quick scan of the infrastructure for the same threat on other endpoints.

Are your employees sufficiently aware of cyberthreats?

Returning to the issue of alert overload: cybersecurity specialists working with an EDR system while investigating an incident sometimes find that the cause of the alert was human error — someone opened a malicious attachment in an email, or followed a link to a phishing web page. Experience shows that raising employee awareness significantly reduces the workload on cybersecurity teams in general, and the alert volume in particular. For this purpose, a well-designed educational program is more effective than lectures and occasional reminders.

This benefit isn’t directly related to XDR functionality; however, each Kaspersky Next XDR Optimum license includes targeted Kaspersky Security Awareness training for employees most likely to cause high-impact incidents (executives, members of finance teams, privileged users, and anyone who’s previously been a victim of social engineering). But most importantly, Next XDR Optimum allows the cybersecurity specialist to assign a relevant course to a user directly from the alert card — without interrupting the incident response. Experience shows that lessons learned immediately after a fail that caused an incident are particularly memorable and useful and so help prevent the same mistake being made again in the future.

If your cybersecurity team feels overwhelmed by alerts, or needs more management tools and threat context, it’s worth considering a move over to Kaspersky XDR Optimum. Migrating from Kaspersky EDR Optimum to XDR Optimum doesn’t require additional resources for deployment or staff retraining. And the slight increase in cost is far outweighed by the significant improvement in your company’s infrastructure security.

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