Most organizations implement passive, relatively static cybersecurity defenses.

They deploy controls such as firewalls, anti-virus, and vulnerability management, and start monitoring for events. They may update these systems, but only based on generic policies such as signature updates and patches.

The problem is that, just like in military strategy, attackers can probe for weaknesses in these passive defensives at leisure, and then apply maximum pressure at the defender’s weak point. This is why determined attackers eventually find a way in, and even if the defender detects the breach, it’s usually too late.

To effectively reduce risk, security teams must adopt Active Defense, and move beyond the passive approach. Active Defense blends several tactics that dynamically modify defenses based on situational awareness and in response to actual threat actor activity. These tactics are proven components of industry standard frameworks such as MITRE Shield and the NIST CyberSecurity Framework (CSF).

Acalvio is a pioneer in Active Defense strategies, leveraging innovations in Distributed Deception, Artificial Intelligence, and Threat Analysis. We enable high-fidelity actionable detection and attacker dwell time reduction, while avoiding false positives and alert fatigue.

The daily examples of compromises and successful attacks demonstrate that organizations must move to an Active Defense posture. When implemented using Acalvio ShadowPlex Autonomous Deception, Active Defense will provide significant risk reduction benefits, without substantial operational overhead.