Cisco Talos: A Summary Explanation

PETER WELCHER | Solutions Architect 

Cisco Talos has been integrated with Cisco’s security offerings for quite some time, but it seems invisible to those who don’t know its history. This blog examines what Talos does, and why a Cisco customer might care.

So, What Does Talos Do? 

Talos is, first and foremost, a group of security experts who indirectly support Cisco security products with threat analysis and malware/attack tracking and identification.  

Talos ingests massive amounts of flow and other data, including human-originated reports of malicious sites, making Talos a powerful tool for identifying new security threats in the IT world: new attack vectors, new variants of old threats, etc.  

The resulting information is then incorporated into Cisco Security Products to identify the ever-growing number of threats, attacks, and hacker groups. Talos also provides information to the public, including aggregated information: trends in attack vectors, newly disclosed vulnerabilities, etc.  

Additionally, Talos provides open-source tools that security professionals can use to analyze risk exposure and identify hacker/malware attacks.  

Last but certainly not least, Talos provides security services. In particular, Talos provides proactive and emergency Incident Response services to help customers enhance their security, prepare for a breach, and respond to a breach.  

We strongly recommend incorporating security services as a part of your Worst-Case scenario plans. Ransomware attacks are on the rise across industries, so if you haven’t planned for a breach (especially a ransomware breach), your response time will be hindered from the start. Always keep in mind the 5 P’s: Proper Planning Prevents … Poor Performance. 

See also https://www.talosintelligence.com/incident_response to learn more about the ways in which they can help. 

Links 

• https://www.talosintelligence.com 
• https://www.talosintelligence.com/software 
• https://www.telcion.com/blog/2020/09/why-you-need-cisco-talos 
• https://blog.talosintelligence.com 
• https://blog.talosintelligence.com/category/threat-source-newsletter/ 

Conclusion 

A major part of security is planning and preparedness, so Talos can provide an excellent foundation for your security strategy.