Michael Schiebel has an introduction to the thought process behind security analytics:
Now, we’re getting somewhere. Looking at this graph we see we have four high-level problems we are trying to solve.
(Unknown/Unknown) The first step in realizing that we have a problem is accepting that we may not have the answer. We may not have the right mental or computational models; or even the right data to find bad things.
(Known/Unknown) We’ve invested time and energy brainstorming what could happen, sought out and collected the data we believe will help, and created mental and conceptual models that SHOULD detect/visualize these bad things. Now, we need to hunt and seek to see if we’re right.
(Unknown/Known) We’ve been hunting and seeking for some time tuning and training our analytical models until they can automatically detect this new bad thing. Now we need to spend some time formalizing our response process to this new use case.
(Known/Known) Great, we’ve matured this use case to a point that we can trust our ability to detect; maybe even to the point of efficient rules/signatures. We have mature response playbooks written for our SOC analysts to follow. Now we can feel comfortable enough to design and implement an automated response for this use case.
I think his breakdown is correct, and also would reiterate that within any organization, all four zones come into play, meaning you have different teams of people working concurrently; you’ll never automate away all the problems.