EDR vs. XDR: Understand the Key Differences

Cybersecurity threats are constantly evolving, and the growing global workforce brings hundreds of thousands of additional endpoint devices online every year. Endpoints (user devices like laptops, desktops and mobile devices) are especially susceptible to malware and digital exploits, making them prime targets for cybercriminals.

There are different approaches to managing your infrastructure and endpoint security. Two popular approaches are Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR), which focuses on endpoint devices, and Extended Detection and Response (XDR), a fully integrated solution that monitors your entire infrastructure for threats. 

Both approaches are viable because endpoints and infrastructure are targets for cybercriminals, but the size of your organization, how it’s structured and your technical capacity will all play a role in deciding which makes the most sense for you.

EDR detects threats on endpoints automatically and responds in real time. It does this by either blocking the threat or isolating the device from the rest of the network. EDR also provides logs about the system, like file changes, network activity and system event logs for quick investigations.

How EDR works

EDR works by deploying software agents onto endpoint devices on your network. These agents constantly monitor your endpoint’s activities and build up a baseline profile of what normal operations look like over time. This profile is then used as a comparison when the EDR detects anything out of the ordinary.

Key EDR features and benefits 

Below are some of the features that make EDR solutions so effective at protecting endpoint devices.

Agent-based data collection and monitoring

Lightweight software agents are deployed across the organization onto individual endpoint devices. These agents are constantly monitoring device activity and collecting data about the system’s processes, file activity, network traffic and user actions.

Alert generation and threat response

When the activity on the endpoint device breaches any of the baseline thresholds that were initially established, the EDR knows that further investigation is needed and an alert is triggered. This alert notifies the security team, which can then initiate incident response procedures and basic triage, depending on how serious the threat is.

Behavioral analysis and advanced threat detection

EDR is very good at behavioral analysis and can spot threats even when signature-based detection fails to find anything. This makes it quite capable of finding malware, which is always evolving. EDRs don’t just look for malware signatures; they can infer malicious intent by analyzing user patterns.

XDR takes the same endpoint protection concepts from EDR but builds on them with a complete infrastructure monitoring solution. It takes network data, endpoints, servers, applications, and cloud services to create a data-rich security monitoring resource. 

How XDR works 

XDR works on the assumption that attackers use multiple threat vectors and surfaces. If you think about common scenarios where there is an attack, it often escalates over multiple steps. For example, a phishing email compromises an endpoint device and captures credentials. From there, the attack moves laterally across the network to other devices where it can leverage vulnerabilities such as a kernel exploit to escalate their privileges. At this point the attacker can exfiltrate sensitive data or deploy ransomware across multiple critical systems. Solutions that work in isolation might detect the first or second steps, but if they don't mitigate the threat in real time then the rest of the attack can proceed unnoticed  

Key XDR features and benefits

XDR gives operators context across multiple systems, which once collected and correlated is easier to track and manage than multiple single-point systems that each require separate applications to review. All of the collected data and telemetry allow XDR to piece together information and build a picture of multi-component attacks, rather than single isolated incidents. Security analysts and incident managers get detailed context around security incidents, allowing them to better formulate their security responses for future events.

Centralized analytics  

XDR pulls data from the entire environment into a single repository. It uses advanced analytics engines to dig into this data and find patterns across multiple systems. It filters out legitimate business traffic and uses machine learning (ML) algorithms to identify malicious activity.

Coordinated response and orchestration

When XDR identifies threats, it uses multiple tools to coordinate its response through orchestration. When a device triggers an alert, XDR initiates multiple mitigations across different paths to stop malicious activity before it can spread throughout the network.

Reduced alert fatigue

Security tools generate a great deal of data in the form of warnings, alerts and errors. These alerts can put a strain on your human security teams, which need to verify the data being sent to them. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning play a big part in smoothing out the noise of these alerts, limiting false positives and consolidating multiple related alerts into groups (i.e., alert stitching or attack storyline reconstruction) that are easier to manage.

Similarities between EDR and XDR

Both EDR and XDR focus on proactive threat prevention, using automated isolation orchestrations to stop attacks before they spread. Both solutions use behavioral analytics to find suspicious patterns, which allows them to find novel threats that haven’t yet been widely identified.

Important differences

The biggest difference between these two approaches is the scope of their operations. If you only need visibility into your endpoints, and don’t need network activity correlation, then EDR will deliver. Managing, monitoring and agent deployment are not overly complicated, and most organizations find the process quite simple to set up.

XDR is aimed at environments that need to correlate data between endpoints, networks, servers, applications, cloud environments, and identity platforms. Integrating data from multiple collection sources does require some technical expertise, especially when normalizing the data and setting up the detection parameters for your organization.

The EDR vs. XDR solution comparison comes down to the scope of your infrastructure monitoring requirements. 

When EDR makes sense

If your company operates in an industry that doesn't have a major threat profile like finance or healthcare, then an EDR could provide sufficient coverage without the complexity and expertise required for configuring and managing an XDR solution. 

Likewise, if your organization has basic infrastructure with very few integrated systems or has users that primarily connect via third-party cloud services that you don’t manage, then an EDR that protects user endpoints could be all that you need. 

This is not to say that some industries are immune to cyberthreats — that is definitely not the case, but there are some instances where your endpoint devices are the only link in the chain that your information security teams are responsible for, with the more comprehensive security being handled by cloud providers and other third-party hosting services.

When XDR is essential

Complex environments will benefit from the visibility and orchestrated containment that XDR offers. Companies with cloud environments — including SaaS applications and IaaS infrastructure — and multiple office locations need XDR to gain visibility into the cybersecurity stance of their business operations. 

Your teams need to be able to correlate security events across locations so that they can identify persistent and ongoing threats and multi-stage attacks. If you have complex infrastructure that is connected to multiple sites and accessed via endpoint devices from remote locations, then XDR is essential for stopping threats quickly.

Barracuda Managed XDR combines the endpoint focus of EDR with the overarching coverage of XDR, delivered in a managed service that is tailored to your requirements. Having Barracuda’s SOC comprised of five teams of cybersecurity experts combined with deep endpoint visibility while integrating detailed infrastructure activity and telemetry is a powerful combination. 

It gives you all the benefits of running your own dedicated security team without the initial capital expenditure of building your own SOC, and the savings of not needing to hire and retain cybersecurity professionals that are in high demand globally. This makes the return on investment (ROI) of a solution like Barracuda Managed XDR quite appealing for most cybersecurity departments. 

Barracuda Managed XDR is not a one-size-fits-all solution. Instead, it is customized to your specific needs as an organization. The key is to match the solution elements to your organization's threat landscape, whether it is the security of your distributed workforce’s endpoint devices with EDR, or monitoring and raising incidents for the complex and mission-critical systems that make up your business’s infrastructure.

Ready to explore how Barracuda Managed XDR can strengthen your organization’s security stance? Schedule a consultation with our security experts, or download this comprehensive XDR guide to learn more about how you can implement advanced threat detection and response capabilities of your own.