Being a security analyst tracking down threats can feel like being the Wile E. Coyote to an attacker’s Road Runner. You’re fast, but they’re faster. You set up alerts, but they still manage to get past your defenses. You’re monitoring systems, but they’re still able to hide their criminal activities.

The security of embedded devices is in the news over the last few years, especially IoT assets and OT systems. From connected medical devices to industrial control systems to smartwatches and building automation, connected IoT devices will expand to over 25 billion by 2028.

As a kid, treasure hunts were fun. Someone gave you clues and a map so you could hunt down whatever hidden item they left for you. However, as a security analyst, your incident investigations often have clues but lack a map. An alert fires. You search through your vast collection of log data. You hope to find the next clue while trying to figure out the attacker’s next steps.

The MITRE ATT&CK framework provides the cybersecurity community with information on more than 100 threat actor groups and the platforms they target. The data within the framework comes from publicly available cyber threat intelligence and reports and security teams and threat researchers. ATT&CK is available for free to anyone who wants to use it.

New TTP attack data covering 2023 sheds much needed light on the threat actor and user actions that are putting organizations at the most risk. In cybersecurity vendor ReliaQuest’s Annual Cyber-Threat Report: 2024, there is a ton of great detail mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK Framework outlining which threat actions are used and how organizations are most effectively fighting back and stopping attacks.

Organizations worldwide rely on the MITRE ATT&CK framework as a critical resource for defending against cyberattacks. The MITRE ATT&CK framework is also a key tool for advancing threat research in the cybersecurity industry. However, one of the challenges in using the MITRE ATT&CK framework is mapping the output from logs, sensors and other tools as ATT&CK data sources in the framework.

A correlation between ATT&CK Mitigations and CIS Controls, often termed as a ‘high-level’ mapping, show case the count of mapped ATT&CK (Sub-)Techniques within each ATT&CK Mitigation. Additionally, it provides the total number of ATT&CK (Sub-)Techniques associated with the respective ATT&CK Mitigation. Mitre attack mapping accurately and consistently maps adversary behaviors relevant to ATT&CK techniques as part of cyber threat intelligence (CTI).