What is IDS and IPS?

Fig 1:What is IDS and IPS?

Monitoring your network data and examining it for indications of potential intrusions, such as exploit attempts and occurrences that might pose an immediate threat to your network, is the process of intrusion detection. The process of doing intrusion detection and then putting a stop to the identified instances is known as intrusion prevention, and it usually entails discarding packets or ending connections. These security techniques are accessible as intrusion detection systems (IDS) and intrusion prevention systems (IPS), which are features of next-generation firewalls that are used to detect and prevent possible occurrences (NGFW).

What advantages do IDS/IPS offer?

IDS/IPS keeps an eye on all network traffic to spot any known harmful activity. Exploiting a flaw in a device or piece of software is one of the ways an attacker will try to breach a network. Before any network endpoints are successfully compromised, IDS/IPS detects and stops any exploit attempts. Because they can thwart attackers while they are acquiring data about your network, IDS/IPS are essential security solutions, both at the network edge and inside the data centre.

How does IDS function?

In most cases, incidents are discovered using one of three IDS detection methodologies:

• In order to find potential occurrences, signature-based detection compares signatures to observed events. This is the most basic detection technique because it merely uses string comparison operations to compare the current unit of activity (such a packet or a log entry) to a list of signatures.
• In order to find significant deviations, anomaly-based detection compares definitions of what is regarded as normal activity with observed events. When identifying previously unidentified dangers, this detection technique can be quite effective.
• In order to spot deviations, stateful protocol analysis compares preset profiles of generally recognized definitions for benign protocol activity for each protocol state against observed occurrences.

What Can IDS/IPS Be Used For?

Your network is always being monitored by intrusion detection systems (IDS) and intrusion prevention systems (IPS), which spot potential occurrences, record information about them, put a stop to them, and then report them to security administrators. Additionally, some networks employ IDS/IPS to spot issues with security regulations and discourage users from disobeying them. Due to their ability to thwart attackers while they are gathering information about your network, IDS/IPS have become an essential component of the security infrastructure of the majority of enterprises.