Every time your employees go online – loading websites, using cloud apps, or syncing data – your systems rely on the Domain Name System (DNS) to get them where they need to go. DNS quietly translates domain names into IP addresses, making everything happen behind the scenes.

But DNS isn’t just for the good guys. Attackers and intruders rely on it, too—to communicate with malware, steal data, and disguise malicious activity. For any organization, especially smaller ones, this creates a significant risk: the same system that keeps you running can also expose you to threats if left unprotected.  The threat landscape related to DNS is evolving rapidly:

• Threat Actors are using AI to produce malware variants, modify phishing emails, and other parts of their attacks at an increasingly rapid pace
• Lookalike domain spearphishing attacks accounted for 66% of data breaches in 2023 (Source: Barracuda); these attacks often evade existing defenses
• On average, 200,000 new domains are created every day, making it hard to stay on top of potentially malicious ones
• Traffic Distribution Systems (TDSs) are increasingly being used in phishing distribution to evade detection

Securely Managed and Infoblox

Securely Managed has partnered with industry leading DNS software company, Infoblox to provide comprehensive DNS detection and response services to our clients.

Why DNS Detection and Response?

DNS Detection and Response (DNSDR) is one of the key components of a comprehensive Managed Detection and Response strategy.  By deploying DNSDR, an organization can reap the following benefits:

• Identify threats sooner

Modern threats often go undetected until they cause significant damage. Traditional security tools react only after incidents occur, placing you in the “regret zone.” The Domain Name System (DNS) unlocks a world of security capabilities that protect your network. By adding DNS Security to your SOC services, you can detect threats early in the “pre-crime” zone, protecting your infrastructure by anticipating and blocking threats before they strike.

• Leverage the crucial role of DNS

Customers find it difficult to secure a variety of hardware, operating systems, and environments, including PCs, servers, cloud workloads, and IoT devices. DNS is an excellent tool for threat monitoring because it is present across all IP-enabled devices, making it a central point for alerting or blocking threats.

• Built-in predictive threat intelligence

DNSDR tracks more than 204,000 threat actor clusters. It understands these threat actors even when they switch tactics and IP address, allowing it to block 5x more risky domains. With the built-in AI/ML-driven analytics, there is a continuous analysis of DNS behavior to identify and stop malicious DNS activities.

• Traditional tools miss risky domains

Traditional security tools may miss many risky domains and malicious behaviors as DNS is not the focus of their protections. Customers need advanced AI/ML capabilities to identify high-risk domains using a pre-emptive/proactive approach with DNS Threat Intelligence. DNS Detection and Response capabilities will inspect your DNS traffic and use algorithms/ AI to detect and block threats such as data exfiltration/DNS tunneling, DGAs, and Zero Day DNSTM.

• Zero day DNS domains pose risks

Zero Day DNS is the ability of Infoblox to inspect new domains upon the first visit, tracking and analyzing them to allow, alert, or block them based on your settings. This proactive and fast approach enables you to neutralize threats after the first DNS query, ensuring your company’s security posture is robust and resilient without the need to wait for a malicious payload or malware incident to occur.

• Protect your brand

Customers need robust solutions to prevent brand impersonation and protect their reputation. DNSDR service from Securely Managed offers advanced tools for proactive detection of lookalike domains. SM can also assist with mitigating domain issues and provide 30 days of monitoring to ensure malicious/suspicious domains do not reappear.

• Coverage across all assets

Todays IT assets are everywhere; on-prem and in the cloud. Today’s IT assets include the standard IT devices but also IoT assets. Our solution provides deep asset visibility that ties DNS events to specific users, devices, locations, and VLANs. Though you can use an agent if so desired, our solution will provide the same result without the agent.

SM offers affordable DNS Detection and Response offering as part of our MDR services; to monitor and control DNS traffic so you can stop attacks before they cause damage.

SM provides free DNS assessment.  For more information on SM’s comprehensive MDR services, please visit our website, www.securelymanaged.com.

For a closer look at how DNS Detection and Response protects your organization, download our brochures and watch the short videos below. They break down key concepts, common attack techniques, and how proactive DNS monitoring keeps you out of the “regret zone.”

DNS Overview Video

Information Video

Benefits of DNS Video

How DNS Works Video