Since the evolution of sophisticated threats and cyber risks has been witnessed recently, there’s a great demand for advanced cybersecurity solutions that are required to be combined with traditional methods of defense. Thus, a career as a SOC Analyst has become popular these days. Such professionals are responsible for monitoring and detecting threats, tracking the alerts, and escalating them. They also are considered to be front-line defenders that notify other professionals about the upcoming cyber threats, implement SIEM solutions, and use predictive capabilities. The absence of such professionals can negatively affect the organization, that’s why these specialists are highly valuable at their workplaces. The SOC Analyst certification issued by EC-Council can be gained by passing the 312-39 exam.
The best target audience for this designation include candidates who’ve set the goal to become a SOC Analyst, entry-level cybersecurity professionals, cybersecurity analysts, or SOC Analysts (Tier I or II). In addition, if you work as a network or security admin, network or security engineer, network defense analyst, network security specialist, network security operator, you can opt for this EC-Council designation. It’s also recommended for candidates to have one year of work experience in the security or network admin domain and pass the official training before sitting for the exam.
What does the Certified SOC Analyst (312-39) exam entail? This exam contains 100 multiple choice questions which you are to crack within 3 hours. To pass the test, you need to score 70% of the correct answers. You can register for the 312-39 exam at the EC-Council Exam Portal.
Passing the exam means that you possess the skills required to complete the daily tasks of a SOC analyst and understand the whole SOC workflow. It testifies that you are knowledgeable of the fundamentals of SOC operations, log management, SIEM deployment, modern incident detection and response. You are also able to operate SOC procedures and can cooperate with CSIRT when needed. To be more precise, the 312-39 exam consists of 6 sections. The first one covers security operations and management topic. Here, the SOC fundamentals, elements of SOC (people, procedures, and technology), and understanding the usage of SOC will be checked.
The second part is dedicated to cyber threats, IoCs, and attack methodology. This implies that you are capable of describing the term cyber threats & attacks, understanding the Host Level, App Level, and Network Level attacks. The ability to explain the Attacker’s hacking methodology is also a part of the tested topic.
The third topic focuses on incidents, events, and logging. In this section, your understanding of the fundamentals of incidents, events, and logging, nuts and bolts of local and centralized logging will be measured.
The fourth part deals with incident detection with SIEM (Security Information and Event Management). Within this topic, you should know how to implement the SIEM deployment, be ready to demonstrate your understanding of the main concepts of SIEM, and explain SIEM solutions. You also should be knowledgeable of different use case examples for app level incident detection, insider incident detection, network level and host level incident detection. Your knowledge of use case examples for compliance and the concepts of handling alert triaging and analysis will also be checked.
The fifth section is devoted to enhanced incident detection with threat intelligence. In this part, you should have a good understanding of the basic concepts on threat intelligence, know the types of threat intelligence, and be knowledgeable of how the threat intelligence is developed. In addition, you should know different threat intelligence platforms along with the sources to gain Intelligence.
The sixth topic aims to check your skills in implementing incident response. Your knowledge of the main concepts of incident response and phases in incident response procedures will be assessed here. Besides, you should know how to respond to network security issues, app security and email security incidents, insider incidents and malware incidents.
As stated on the Ziprecruiter website, your annual salary can range from $75,000 to $141,000. So, you always can deepen your knowledge and skills, gain more experience, and increase your pay check.