Affectedness scoring engine for cyber threat intelligence services

Abstract

A network-accessible cyber-threat security analytics service is configured to characterize and respond to a description that includes threat indicators (e.g., IOCs), and an initial severity. Enterprises register with the service by providing identifying information, such as industry, geographies, and the like. For each threat indicator, a query is sent to each of a set of one or more security knowledge bases, and at least some of the queries are scoped by the enterprise industry/geo information specified. The knowledge bases may vary but typically include: a managed security service, a cyber threat intelligence service, and a federated search engine that searches across one or more enterprise-connected data sources. Responses to the queries are collected. A response provides an indication whether the threat indicator identified in the query has been sighted in the knowledge base and the frequency. The system then adjusts the initial severity to reflect the indications returned from querying the security knowledge bases.