Blog - Integrity Technology Solutions

How Application Control Works For MDRs

Written by Integrity Staff | September 19, 2023 at 3:00 PM

Blackpoint is a leading cybersecurity firm with a focus on allowing the companies they serve to thrive in the data security world, rather than simply avoid active threats and survive. 

Their real response methodology is designed to be compatible with real response security for robust data protection, and they provide a round-the-clock managed detection and response platform for superior results. 

This innovative approach has made Blackpoint a top choice among top business decision-makers.

Over the last year, the company has brought two new security assets online, which is our topic here. 

They are managed detection response and application control. 

Here, we will discuss what these are and how they work together to tighten data security for the companies they serve.

 

Application Control & MDR: Blackpoint's Powerful, New Cybersecurity Assets

Managed detection and response (MDR) is a service designed to combine a technological approach to cybersecurity with live, human expertise.

This could be thought of as the fusion of man and machine in the hunt for cyber threats.

Indeed, according to cyber security experts, this is exactly what it is.

The primary benefit of MDR is the rapid identification of threats and the containment of the harm that hackers and malware can do.

MDR's complementary cybersecurity toolset, application control, is the perfect partner for MDR.

Together, these systems and approaches not only detect and respond to cyber threats, but they actively shut them down.

 

Definitions

  • Managed Detection Response: A comprehensive, managed cybersecurity service in which live security experts work with advanced detection tools to seek out and eliminate active data security threats.
  • Application Control: A practice, software, or toolset that enables security personnel or tools to stop or prevent unauthorized applications from running on a given system. 

 

The Advantages of MDR

As one of the most advanced and innovative cybersecurity methodologies available today, MDR comes with several unique and powerful benefits.

 

24-Hour Monitoring

With automated software and hardware tools running around the clock, MDR combines these proven tools with the expertise of live data security experts.

As we have seen with recent AI developments, adding human supervision reduces machine error and prevents potential threats from escaping detection.

 

Proactive Security

With unsupervised cybersecurity software, there is always a chance that the machine's response to threats will be inadequate.

But with the guidance of human experts, all red flags can be investigated and responded to.

Even if a given warning signal is not fully understood, security measures against it can still be taken.

 

Superior Intelligence

While it is both poetic and elegant to say that we are merging the strengths of man and machine, MDR does this in reality, rather than just rhetorically.

It leverages the best of both forms of intelligence and minimizes the weaknesses of each as well.

 

Expert Analysts

Naturally, the difference between good MDR and great MDR is the quality of the cybersecurity experts supervising the system.

With Blackpoint, the quality of live teams is never compromised, resulting in the lowest error rate of any premium cybersecurity service.

 

Vulnerability Control

The management of vulnerabilities can be one of the most difficult parts of cybersecurity.

With a combination of live human teams, round-the-clock active monitoring can be realized with automated tools working tirelessly at the same time.

As experts persistently scan for vulnerable systems, the applications do the same.

Superior Compliance

Regulatory compliance is one of the most under-recognized aspects of cybersecurity.

Any organization that handles the sensitive data of its customers must remain compliant at all times.

Failure to do so can result in hefty fines, even if a breach has not occurred.

For this reason, MDR teams and tools also persistently monitor for active regulatory compliance.

 

The Advantages of Application Control

Application control is a combination of automation and human-leveraged tools that enables MDR experts and systems to shut down threats and potential threats as they emerge.

Application control is something like opening a control panel displaying processes running on a machine and using administrator privileges to stop those processes.

For the average computer user, that sort of thing has become fairly uncommon.

But in cybersecurity, Blackpoint has enhanced it to close suspicious scripts in real time.

 

Malware Prevention

With both human and machine eyes on the application control monitor, suspicious scripts, programs, and applications are terminated swiftly.

Data security experts recognize this as a critical capability in the fight against cyber threats, as automated systems working alone lack the authorization and insight to impose a robust defense.

 

Exploit Prevention

Exploits can come in many forms, but they usually have human intelligence behind them.

For this reason, they can go undetected by security software. Exploits are also known as backdoors into system vulnerabilities.

Application Control lets experts close these backdoors and prevent their exploitation both preemptively and as they occur.

 

Application Monitoring

Finally, trusted applications themselves can become corrupted and then function as malware.

Similarly, viruses and malware can hide behind other harmful scripts to escape detection.

For these reasons, active monitoring by expert security personnel is critical.

Application control is best known for its ability to stop threats, but it also lets security experts and tools enable security applications to continue to do their jobs, even when malware or exploits might successfully shut them down.

 

Powerful Cybersecurity Assets Working Together

Even the most advanced machines do not truly understand the world or the consequences of cybersecurity issues. But they process digital information better than any human can.

Human understanding of these and related issues is invaluable in the interception and neutralization of threats.

MDR brings man and machine together for superior results, and application control gives this melding of intelligence types the power to track and neutralize threats in real time.

MDR represents the fusion of human and machine intelligence to detect and assess threats to sensitive data and application monitoring is a premiere weapon that machine and human security can use to shut threats down in real time. 

Of course, a premier cybersecurity firm like Blackpoint has far more to offer than the tools and methodologies discussed here.

These are just the latest assets in the ongoing arms race against cyber attacks and the bad actors behind them.

 

Sources