Every year – sometimes every day – our world grows a little more volatile. A state of constant disruption has become the new normal. The role of security and intelligence professionals is becoming more critical and challenging as a result. While the notion of “eyes everywhere” might sound appealing, it’s not only impractical but also inefficient. The smarter approach is to focus your resources on monitoring only the situations that directly impact your organization.
This is where the power of customized intelligence alerts comes into play. Customized intelligence alerts are notifications tailored to the specific threats to your organization. By narrowing the lens, these alerts make you hyperaware of specific and localized threats, such as geopolitical instability, supply chain vulnerabilities, or weather emergencies that could jeopardize your organization. Instead, this proactive stance helps to safeguard current operations and support new opportunities.
Combat Three Security Challenges with Intelligence Alerts
Security professionals grapple with many challenges. Among the most common are data overload, alert fatigue, and staff burnout. A threat intelligence platform with customized intelligence alerts effectively addresses all three.
Data Overload
Even the best strategies can’t succeed without pinpointed intelligence. Yet, every day, security professionals must analyze a staggering amount of input from a multitude of sources. It simply isn’t feasible to manually sort through all social media and news outlets to extract what’s genuinely relevant. The sheer volume and complexity of the data can overwhelm even the most seasoned professionals. Identifying and focusing on relevant threats becomes difficult. Decision-making is slowed. Crucial time is lost to tactical delays, which translates into significant operational risks.
Alert Fatigue
The hurdles don’t end with the overwhelming amount of data. The human element of these challenges is also crucial. Alert fatigue is a problem for many security centers. When you’re inundated with a constant barrage of alerts, many of which may not even be relevant to your specific operational needs, it’s easy to tune out the noise. The risk of overlooking a critical alert becomes alarmingly high. This impedes effective action and leads to a waste of time and money.
Staff Burnout
High levels of alert fatigue contribute to staff burnout, which in turn leads to higher turnover rates. This is particularly problematic given that, according to surveys conducted in 2019 and 2020, 70% of security executives cited the ability to attract, onboard, and retain skilled professionals as a top concern. Customized intelligence alerts can mitigate the issue by creating a more streamlined and less stressful work environment, thereby contributing to higher levels of job satisfaction and ultimately, better talent retention.
Implementing a threat intelligence platform is the best first step in combating these issues. Intelligent alerts are a critical feature that takes that platform to the next level, putting only the most pertinent insights on your dashboard or in your inbox. Further, by focusing solely on the threat arenas that are directly relevant to your organization, tailored alerts significantly reduce alert fatigue, optimizing limited human capital and other resources.
How to Select the Right Intelligence Platform
Forbes reports, “Established companies typically face alert overload in the form of tool sprawl.” Avoid adding more software to the mix at your security center. Selecting the right platform is a critical decision that can turn strategy into tactics and significantly impact the effectiveness of your security operations. Instead, look for a comprehensive threat intelligence platform that aligns closely with your organization’s specific needs. When making your choice, look beyond the number of features a platform offers to the relevance of those features. Focus on how well those features meet your organization’s unique needs and operational challenges. Make sure the platform you select delivers:
- A level of alert customization that will meet your organization’s needs
- Data-driven intelligence backed up by human verification
- Centralized information that will provide full picture analysis
The primary advantage of these alerts lies in their ability to cut through the static and deliver only the information you need to drive swift, decisive action. Generic alerts based solely on geofencing or threat areas such as crime, unrest, or terrorism will leave you bogged down in a reactive cycle of sorting through irrelevant notifications. Instead, the most customizable platforms allow you to layer in advanced Boolean logic so that your team can focus solely on the threats that matter. Look for features such as including or excluding keywords, tripwires, instant notifications, and shareability. These will allow for faster, more informed decision making.
With a cutting-edge platform in place, you won’t just respond to threats as they occur, you’ll anticipate and prepare for them. To understand customized intelligence alerts in action, consider what happened when Seerist’s platform noticed a decline in stability in Kazakhstan. The dip in the Pulse AI score preceded an outbreak of protests, a State of Emergency, and the deployment of Russian-led forces within a week. Security teams leveraged the alert notification to prepare and protect personnel, assets, and operations.
Get Ahead of Threats with Seerist
Manual processes slow triage. Leveraging the power of artificial intelligence combined with the expertise of over 200 risk analysts, Seerist’s customized alerts give you only the information you need, when you need it. Our solution provides AI-powered data and real-time, actionable insights that will ensure your security center succeeds. Boost the speed and accuracy of your threat response. Request a demo of Seerist today.
