The occurrence of security breaches is not a yearly occurrence. Recently, security breaches have been reported on a daily basis. Considering the level of danger, organizations must take information security seriously. A company cannot allow hackers to steal vital information without putting its entire operation in danger. Enterprises have begun investing in SecOps powered by AIOps tools to address cybersecurity challenges.

SecOps is a synergy between the IT operations and the security department of the organization. By merging the departments, it means the tools, resources, and technologies will be shared by both teams. Both teams will have a pre-defined workflow for boosting the service availability of software products. Some organizations have even taken a step ahead and started investing in DevSecOps (a synergy between developers, security, and operations experts).

With SecOps, organizations have embedded security into every step of software development. Software products will not be developed without the advice of security experts. On the other hand, security professionals will seek the advice of operations experts to remove vulnerabilities. Earlier, software developers used agile methodology to launch new products quickly. However, they ignored the security of products to meet the speed requirements. With SecOps, the speed of software deployment will not come at the cost of security.

SecOps sounds exciting and is the solution to achieve high service availability. However, not every enterprise succeeds in boosting service availability with SecOps processes. It is because the SecOps processes aren’t implemented the right way. One must be aware of the challenges faced during SecOps implementation. Let us discuss the common SecOps implementation challenges and how to overcome them.

Here are some of the common SecOps implementation challenges and ways to overcome them:

1. A large number of endpoints – Cloud-native environments have become more and more popular in recent years. Businesses favour the speed and scalability of cloud-native environments. A cloud platform can be used to host the entire IT infrastructure. Employees connect to cloud-native platforms in 2023 using smart devices. Security teams formerly just had to take care of the systems that were connected to the IT infrastructure. They now have to cope with the Internet of Things (IoT) and other smart devices linked to cloud-native platforms. Since the number of endpoints has increased, security has become more complex.

Endpoint security is also affected due to the rising popularity of remote work culture. With the remote work culture, enterprises are promoting BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) policies. Security teams have a hard time offering service reliability on remote devices that have been connected to the company’s network for the first time. Every personal device connecting to the IT network creates a vulnerability. The private device might not be secure and create a blind spot in the organisation’s security. The same happens when a private smart device is connected to the IT network of the enterprise.

If the endpoints aren’t secured even after SecOps implementation, there might be some problems. During SecOps implementation, enterprises fail to integrate the existing tools. For example, the enterprises might fail to integrate the EDR (Endpoint Detection and Response) tools of the security and operations teams. As a result, teams cannot identify the endpoints connected to the main network and offer security. During SecOps implementation, enterprises must pay special attention to integrating existing security tools.

2. The issue with security analysis – The size of performance and monitoring data keeps growing in the IT industry. There are countless software systems, network devices, smart gadgets, and applications that need to be monitored by businesses. The security teams have a difficult time analysing the performance data because every component of the IT infrastructure generates it. The manual security analysis is not practical, even when security and operations personnel collaborate.

The main aim of SecOps implementation is to completely secure the IT network. However, SecOps teams do not know how to boost service reliability when security analysis is not up to the mark. Without security analysis, teams cannot separate the abnormal behaviour of endpoints/systems from normal behaviour. Not to forget, root cause analysis and event correlation will also suffer due to poor security analysis.

In large and complex environments, manual data analysis is not possible. While implementing SecOps, enterprises must focus on automated solutions for security analysis. Once the manual burden of security analysis is removed from the shoulders of SecOps teams, they can focus on the proactive security of the organisation. AIOps based analysis platforms are the best when it comes to automated security analysis in large and complex IT environments.

3. Introducing a cultural shift – The majority of businesses believe that SecOps implementation consists solely of bringing security and operations teams together. They overlook the fact that SecOps involves a change in every employee’s culture. By implementing SecOps, an organisation promises to prioritise security in all circumstances. Most businesses struggle to implement SecOps because they don’t raise awareness of the issue. Make sure the staff is aware of the company’s key resources. Inform them that security will take top emphasis going forward. SecOps implementation will be successful once staff members accept the culture change. A SecOps policy for the staff members would also be beneficial.

4. Finding the right security talent – The vulnerabilities have grown along with the number of endpoints and software systems. All throughout the day, security systems produce alarms. Regrettably, security professionals are already behind in security analysis and cannot respond to security alarms. The company might consider adding more security personnel in such a circumstance.

The need to increase the size of the SecOps team will occur continuously. As the enterprise scale, you might require a few more security employees. Since it is not feasible, SecOps implementation might fail badly. Luckily, organisations have automation solutions like an AIOps-based analytics platform to do well with a limited SecOps team.

SecOps will only improve the security of the organization when it is executed properly. The use of AIOps tools for security analysis and monitoring must be a priority for businesses. It will ease the strain of manual labor on the SecOps staff. Also, businesses must enforce a stringent SecOps policy for staff. SecOps can help you become more secure right away!