What is our primary use case?
My main use case for Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response is detecting and responding to security threats. My job involves responding to the alerts that Arctic Wolf detects and managing their risks by either hardening and patching devices and endpoints, or by responding to an alert, investigating, and remediating incidents.
A recent situation where I used Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response to respond to a threat involved an alert indicating that a user's account may have been breached. I was able to investigate and confirm what was occurring after an incident where a user had multiple sign-in failures and eventually a malicious user was able to access their account.
Once I received the alert from Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response, the first thing I did to investigate and remediate the situation was to validate the alert by examining the logs and confirming the sign-in logs in Entra ID to determine that the user was indeed breached and that the malicious user was able to guess that user's password. After that confirmation, I immediately contained the user by disabling the account, resetting their password, and ensuring MFA was enabled.
What is most valuable?
I would say Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response functions as our SOC SIEM solution. They handle a lot of the triaging and early detection of incidents, and I respond to them, so it has been effective.
The best features that Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response offers are that it is very hands-off. They handle much of the initial detection and response, which can be very helpful for a small team, allowing them to focus on other tasks without being overwhelmed with numerous incident alerts and noise.
Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response reduces alert noise and helps my team focus because they are the first ones to review these incident logs and determine if something requires escalation to me. Instead of having to examine all these various logs coming in, they ingest and review them, then determine if escalation is needed. Another benefit is that if they identify something that appears to be a significant risk, they have the ability to step in and block, contain, or act on that alert, which saves me time and helps when issues arise.
Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response has had a positive impact on my organization because it has reduced the number of people needed to review these logs, which reduces our overhead. This frees up time for my internal IT users to focus on other things since this service handles much of the initial investigation work and log reviews, saving us considerable time and allowing us to focus on more important tasks.
What needs improvement?
The aspects I do not favor about Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response are that their detection generates a lot of false positives, and their concierge team is not always the best, leading to considerable back and forth which can be frustrating when submitting a ticket to have something resolved.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response for approximately two years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
In my experience, Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response is stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The scalability of Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response is good for a small to mid-sized company.
How are customer service and support?
Customer support for Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response is acceptable; it is not the best, but it is not the worst.
My advice for others considering Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response would be to exercise care with its setup and to be aware that their concierge team is not always the best.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
Before Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response, we had something similar called Talus, but we switched because we needed something better as our team was growing, our infrastructure was expanding, and our company was developing.
What was our ROI?
I cannot provide exact numbers concerning return on investment, but I can confirm it has definitely reduced the need for additional staff.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response is that the pricing seemed to be fairly competitive compared to what was available, and they offered us a favorable entry price.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Before choosing Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response, we did evaluate other options including Microsoft Sentinel and CrowdStrike, but I do not have complete details to provide.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.