Book Image

The Foundations of Threat Hunting

By : Chad Maurice, Jeremy Thompson, William Copeland
Book Image

The Foundations of Threat Hunting

By: Chad Maurice, Jeremy Thompson, William Copeland

Overview of this book

Threat hunting is a concept that takes traditional cyber defense and spins it onto its head. It moves the bar for network defenses beyond looking at the known threats and allows a team to pursue adversaries that are attacking in novel ways that have not previously been seen. To successfully track down and remove these advanced attackers, a solid understanding of the foundational concepts and requirements of the threat hunting framework is needed. Moreover, to confidently employ threat hunting in a business landscape, the same team will need to be able to customize that framework to fit a customer’s particular use case. This book breaks down the fundamental pieces of a threat hunting team, the stages of a hunt, and the process that needs to be followed through planning, execution, and recovery. It will take you through the process of threat hunting, starting from understanding cybersecurity basics through to the in-depth requirements of building a mature hunting capability. This is provided through written instructions as well as multiple story-driven scenarios that show the correct (and incorrect) way to effectively conduct a threat hunt. By the end of this cyber threat hunting book, you’ll be able to identify the processes of handicapping an immature cyber threat hunt team and systematically progress the hunting capabilities to maturity.
Table of Contents (19 chapters)
1
Part 1: Preparation – Why and How to Start the Hunting Process
9
Part 2: Execution – Conducting a Hunt
14
Part 3: Recovery – Post-Hunt Activity

Processes and procedures

When it comes to documentation, the most basic communication to document will be operator tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs). These are the day-to-day and minute-to-minute actions that operators and analysts take throughout the life cycle of a threat hunt. To break this down further, think of TTPs like this:

  • Tactic: A general concept or way of approaching a problem.

Example: Performing a denial-of-service (DoS) attack against a target.

  • Technique: Narrower in focus than a tactic, should include specific mechanisms used to accomplish the required action.

Example: Performing a DoS attack using Low Orbit Ion Cannon (LOIC) on port 80/Transmission Control Protocol (TCP).

  • Procedure: Very specific directions, requirements, and toolsets an individual would follow to achieve the desired outcome. These are typically tested, honed, and verified prior to use on client networks.

Example: Step-by-step directions on how...