Cyber Attacks Don’t Wait. Make Sure Your SOC Team Is Trained
Cyber Attacks Don’t Wait. Make Sure Your SOC Team Is Trained
It is not possible to predict when a serious attack will hit your organization, so make sure you take time to do the advance training for your experts.
By Dr. Edward Amoroso, CEO TAG Infosphere and Research Professor, NYU
Introduction
If there is one thing I’ve learned in my four decades in cybersecurity, it is that our adversaries operate on their own schedule. It would be nonsense, for example, to imagine them sitting around and waiting for your SOC team to be ready. And they certainly will not wait for then to finish onboarding a new analyst or complete their quarterly compliance training. Instead, they are active when they choose to engage.
This means that your team must be ready, and not just in theory. At TAG, we’ve observed repeatedly that the difference between a contained event and a full-blown breach often comes down to whether the SOC team has had hands-on, live-fire simulation training.
Attack Timelines vs. Readiness Timelines
One of the more common findings from our enterprise security support and our assessments is a dangerous mismatch between the pace of cyber-attacks and the preparation cycles of SOC teams. Many organizations schedule training sporadically, or worse, assume new hires will "pick it up on the job."
Meanwhile, attackers continue to innovate, automate, and launch attacks at scale. The simple truth is this: If your SOC team is not proactively training on realistic threat scenarios, then you’re betting the farm on something that does not need to be so broken.
We recommend aligning training cadence with threat cadence. That means SOC teams should be running simulations monthly or quarterly. It also means adjusting exercises to reflect current threat intelligence, something that advanced platforms like Cloud Range have made easy to implement.
The False Comfort of Technology Alone
Some will assume that tools can compensate for team inexperience, but our research shows otherwise. Even the most advanced EDR or SIEM platform won’t defend your enterprise unless the human operators know how to interpret alerts, connect data, and make decisions. Too often we find that SOC teams freeze during early incident response, not because they lack intent, but because they lack muscle memory.
Live-fire range training creates this muscle memory. It immerses analysts in simulated attacks, allowing them to learn by doing, not by watching. This is particularly vital during the first few minutes of an attack when time, not tools, is the most precious resource.
Real-Time Skills Are Non-Negotiable
Through dozens of enterprise and government simulations we’ve reviewed or participated in, TAG has found that well-run SOC range training consistently produces the following measurable benefits in the following areas:
Faster Initial Response – Simulations reduce hesitation and help analysts trust their instincts during the first few minutes of an alert.
Stronger Coordination – Live exercises reinforce cross-team communication that often breaks down during real attacks.
Increased Alert Fidelity – Teams that train on telemetry interpretation improve their ability to prioritize real threats over noise.
Cloud Range as a Tactical Enabler
We believe that Cloud Range is one of the few platforms capable of delivering continuous, customized simulation at the scale enterprises require. Their range training supports a variety of attacker tactics, keeps pace with threat trends, and provides measurable feedback on analyst performance. Importantly, it’s designed to mimic not just technical threats, but also the real pressure SOC teams experience when making decisions under stress.
Conclusion
Your SOC preparation should not be left to ad hoc checklists or quarterly tabletop exercises. Live-fire simulation should be a core control, not an optional benefit. The attackers are active now, so your team must be trained now. At TAG, we urge every cybersecurity leader to recognize this reality and ensure their teams have the tools and the training they need to succeed when the next threat hits.
About TAG
Recognized by Fast Company, TAG is a trusted next-generation research and advisory company that utilizes an AI-powered SaaS platform to deliver on-demand insights, guidance, and recommendations to enterprise teams, government agencies, and commercial vendors in cybersecurity and artificial intelligence.
