What Matters in a Managed Detection and Response (MDR) Provider?

As early as 2019, Gartner made note of the fact that there were well over 100 vendors claiming to offer Managed Detection and Response (MDR) services. In Gartner’s 2020 Market Guide for Managed Detection and Response Services¹, the crowded marketplace received additional focus, with two of Gartner’s key findings touching on the issue:

• “The number and variety of MDR providers continues to grow rapidly in an established, but competitive market”
• “Buyers are challenged to differentiate among the variations in delivery approaches and technologies used by MDR service providers”

In a market characterized by a relatively small number of true leaders, dozens of peripheral players and a long list of new entrants, copycat messaging abounds. As a result, it can be legitimately challenging for IT and security leaders—who have enough to deal with already—to try to separate the wheat from the chaff, let alone find the time to do a thorough evaluation between the real solutions.

From our two decades of experience leading the evolution of MDR, from conversations with more than 900 customers, from answering countless RFPs and from external research—including primary research we commissioned—we know what really matters to CISOs and their teams when it comes to making a purchase decision.

Modern MDR forms a virtuous, ever-evolving cycle that efficiently combines proactive and reactive elements to create effective security outcomes

Modern MDR manifests as a virtuous cycle in which risk management and security insights create an ever-evolving implementation customized for each and every client. The figure below captures the different functions and some of their constituent elements:

• Risk Management to improve defensive postures
• Management & Support that alleviates complexity and offloads security work
• Visibility across the organization’s technology footprint
• Detection & Blocking of even the most advanced threats
• Response capability to minimize threat actor dwell time
• Insights to inform security decisions and a reporting Portal to view operational data and trends

Evaluating MDR vendors

The functions introduced on the previous page inform questions that must be asked of every MDR vendor; the table below provides examples.

A few words about weighting

Of course, every organization has a unique environment, with different security priorities and in-house capabilities. Making the right choice, therefore, requires first understanding your organization’s desired outcomes and resources—and then evaluating prospective vendors to see if they meet your requirements.

In practice, this approach leads to giving more importance to some areas than others. For example, an independent study we commissioned found that the three most important requirements organizations are looking for from their MDR vendor are (in this order):

1. Ability to isolate, contain and eliminate threats
2. Threat identification and response times/SLAs
3. Completeness of service

The respondents went on to say that they are looking for an MDR provider who will be a security partner who acts as an extension of their internal security team—taking action on their behalf to isolate, contain and eliminate the threat, ensuring that their IT environment is not breached.

Taken together, these insights suggest that a vendor’s threat Response capabilities will generally exert the largest influence in a purchase decision. Of course, each organization has its own set of priorities which will ultimately determine its buying decision.

In subsequent blogs, we will dive more deeply into the seven functions outlined above to demonstrate how you make sense of the confusing marketplace when you’re searching for an MDR partner.

In the meantime, you might find these additional resources to be of use:

• Gartner’s 2020 Market Guide for Managed Detection and Response Services: Gartner's fifth annual Market Guide for Managed Detection and Response (MDR) Services dives into the growth of this industry-defining category and delivers guidance for buyers seeking to understand the difference between true managed detection and response service providers and traditional managed security service providers (MSSPs)
• The Definitive Guide to Managed Detection and Response: This instructive eBook will help you make more informed cybersecurity choices that align with your business objectives, in-house security resources and risk tolerance levels
• RFP/RFI Sample Questions for Managed Detection and Response Providers
• Five Essential Questions to Ask your MDR Provider
• Real vs Fake MDR

[1] Gartner Market Guide for Managed Detection and Response Services, Toby Bussa, Kelly Kavanagh, Pete Shoard, John Collins, Craig Lawson, Mitchell Schneider, 26 August 2020