Antivirus is the bouncer checking IDs at the door. It knows the troublemakers on its list and turns them away. That still matters, and every computer we manage runs it.
But what about the guest who walks in looking fine and starts rifling through coats an hour later? Many attacks today don’t arrive as a file antivirus recognizes. They arrive as a convincing email, a stolen password, or a legitimate tool used for the wrong reason.
What EDR adds
Endpoint detection and response, or EDR, watches what every laptop and desktop in your office is actually doing. It notices when something starts acting strange, and steps in before one bad click becomes a very long week.
Software isn’t the whole answer
An alert at 2 a.m. only helps if someone acts on it. That’s why the EDR on every computer we manage is backed by managed detection and response: people watching around the clock, able to contain a threat while everyone else sleeps.
Three questions to ask your IT provider
- Do all of our computers run EDR, or just antivirus?
- Who sees the alerts outside business hours, and what are they allowed to do about them?
- When did you last confirm a compromised laptop can be cut off from the network?
If the answers are vague, that’s your answer.