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Threat Intelligence

Threat Intelligence (TI) is the practice of collecting and analyzing information about adversaries, attack techniques, and indicators of compromise to support better decision-making in cybersecurity.

What is Threat Intelligence?How it typically works?Common techniquesImpactFurther reading

What is Threat Intelligence?

Threat intelligence turns raw data into actionable knowledge. It provides SecOps teams with context about threats, enabling them to understand who is attacking, how they operate, and what indicators can be used to detect them. It ranges from tactical feeds of malicious IP addresses to high-level reports about adversary motivations and capabilities. By integrating threat intelligence into SOC workflows, analysts can improve detection, prioritize alerts, and anticipate future attacks.

How it typically works?

  1. Collection: data is gathered from open-source feeds, commercial providers, and internal logs.
  2. Processing: raw data is normalized and correlated.
  3. Analysis: experts or automated systems extract insights about adversaries and techniques.
  4. Dissemination: intelligence is shared with SOC teams, incident responders, or executives.
  5. Feedback loop: intelligence requirements are updated based on evolving threats.

Common techniques

  • Tactical intelligence: lists of malicious IPs, domains, file hashes.
  • Operational intelligence: details of attacker infrastructure, malware families, and campaigns.
  • Strategic intelligence: high-level reports on adversary motivations and industry-specific targeting.
  • Threat feeds: automated streams of indicators integrated into SIEM or firewalls.
  • Dark web monitoring: identifies stolen data and attacker chatter.
  • STIX/TAXII standards: enable automated sharing of threat intelligence.

Impact

Threat intelligence enhances detection by providing context to raw alerts. It helps analysts understand which threats are relevant to their environment and prioritize limited resources. TI also supports proactive defense, enabling organizations to patch vulnerabilities before they are exploited.

However, poorly curated feeds can overwhelm SOCs with false positives. The value of threat intelligence lies in quality, not quantity, and in the ability of SecOps teams to integrate it into workflows.

Further reading

  • MITRE: Threat Intelligence best practices. Read more
  • ENISA: Cyber Threat Intelligence. Read more
  • Gartner: Market Guide for Threat Intelligence. Read more
  • Recorded Future: What is Threat Intelligence? Read more
  • Anomali: Threat intelligence explained. Read more

Related topics

Indicators of Compromise (IOC)Incident ResponseSIEM