Digital Forensics and Incident Response

Key Objectives

• Accelerate Detection and Containment
  • Identify active threats and indicators of compromise quickly and accurately
  • Remove adversaries and stop lateral movement across the environment
  • Minimize dwell time, data loss, and operational impact
• Establish Forensic Clarity
  • Investigate root cause, impact, and attacker methodology through expert forensic analysis
  • Deliver defensible, chain-of-custody compliant evidence
  • Support legal, regulatory, and internal investigations with forensic rigor
• Support Recovery and Eradication
  • Provide actionable steps to recover systems, harden defenses, and prevent recurrence
  • Eliminate persistence, backdoors, and attacker footholds
  • Enable safe, structured return to business-as-usual operations
• Build Organizational Resilience
  • Deliver strategic recommendations for enhancing readiness and security posture
  • Strengthen detection, response, and recovery capabilities for future incidents
  • Transfer knowledge and insight into internal teams and processes
• Support Executive, Legal, and Regulatory Engagement
  • Equip leadership with clear, credible incident narratives and decisions
  • Meet regulatory notification obligations with defensible evidence and reporting
  • Support legal counsel, insurers, and law enforcement engagement as needed

Use Cases & Case Examples

• Ransomware Containment & Recovery, end-to-end support for detection, negotiation posture, recovery, and hardening
• State-Sponsored APT Attribution & Response, advanced adversary investigation and disruption
• Business Email Compromise Investigations, account takeover, fraud, and financial loss events
• VPN, Certificate, and Remote Access Abuse, investigation of exploited access paths and perimeter controls
• Insider Threat and Intellectual Property Theft, forensic examination of employee misconduct and exfiltration
• Critical Infrastructure Breach Resolution, response across OT, ICS, and regulated environments
• Supply Chain and Third-Party Compromise, multi-party investigations across vendor ecosystems
• Cloud and SaaS Platform Incidents, investigation across AWS, Azure, GCP, and major SaaS services

Business Outcomes & Benefits

• Minimized Disruption
  • Swift response and containment reduce downtime, operational losses, and reputational damage
  • Structured recovery planning accelerates return to BAU
  • Reduced revenue impact and customer disruption during and after an event
• Forensic Confidence and Legal Defensibility
  • Defensible, chain-of-custody compliant forensics
  • Support for legal, regulatory, and internal investigations
  • Strong evidence base for prosecutions, claims, and disciplinary actions
• Improved Threat Visibility
  • Uncover stealthy adversaries, fileless malware, and persistent backdoors via advanced forensics
  • Identification of patient zero and full attack timeline
  • Mapping of adversary TTPs to known threat groups (MITRE ATT&CK, APT profiles)
• Operational Readiness and Continuous Improvement
  • Post-incident advisory ensures strengthened detection, containment, and response capabilities
  • Lessons learned embedded into playbooks, controls, and training
  • Measurable uplift in readiness across people, process, and technology
• End-to-End Response Support
  • From initial containment to full recovery and stakeholder reporting
  • Seamless coordination across security, IT, legal, communications, and executive teams
  • Full-spectrum capability for simple, complex, and multi-jurisdictional events
• Reduced Financial, Legal, and Reputational Impact
  • Lower direct incident costs through faster containment and recovery
  • Stronger insurance, regulatory, and legal outcomes through structured evidence
  • Protection of brand, trust, and long-term stakeholder confidence
• Enhanced Board and Executive Confidence
  • Clear, business-relevant narrative on what happened, why, and what next
  • Credible reporting for board, regulator, investor, and insurer engagement
  • Strengthened sponsorship for security investment and transformation
• Support for Regulatory Obligations
  • Alignment with notification timelines under GDPR, DORA, NIS2, HIPAA, SEC, and sector-specific requirements
  • Evidence and reporting suitable for regulator, auditor, and law enforcement engagement
  • Structured approach to cross-jurisdictional incident handling

Key Features

Core Service Components

• Incident Lifecycle Management
  • Triage, scoping, and attack containment
  • Coordination with business stakeholders and IT operations
  • Mitigation of active threats and threat actor eviction
• Digital Forensics
  • Disk and memory image acquisition and analysis (Windows, Linux, macOS)
  • Network traffic and log analysis
  • Malware reverse engineering and indicator extraction
  • Insider threat and employee misconduct investigations
  • Forensic support for ransomware, data theft, IP compromise, and supply chain intrusions
• Root Cause Analysis & Threat Attribution
  • Timeline reconstruction across endpoints, networks, and identities
  • Identification of patient zero and initial access vectors
  • Mapping threat actor TTPs to known APT groups and criminal operations
  • Integration with MITRE ATT&CK and threat intelligence sources
• Rapid Tool Deployment & Threat Hunting
  • Remote deployment of EDR, forensic, and monitoring tools
  • IOC- and TTP-based threat hunting across the environment
  • Custom detection rules for stealthy, targeted behavior
  • Cross-environment hunting across cloud, endpoint, and identity
• Incident Reporting & Executive Communication
  • Executive summaries for boards, regulators, and insurers
  • Forensic evidence logs, IOC lists, and attack timelines
  • Strategic and technical recommendations for remediation and hardening

Additional Features

• 24/7/365 On-Demand Availability, ready when incidents hit
• Remote, Onsite, or Hybrid Response, flexibility aligned to incident criticality and geography
• Compliance With Legal and Regulatory Standards including evidentiary requirements and notification obligations
• Integration With Threat Intelligence and SOC enriched, context-aware response
• Forensic-Grade Evidence Preservation and Analysis, defensible throughout the lifecycle
• Real-World Attacker Simulation Insights shaped by adversarial experience
• Alignment With Industry Standards and Eristotle Frameworks such as NIST SP 800-61, ISO 27035, ENISA, ISOBOK™, CWBOK, and Eristotle competency frameworks

Who Should Use This Service?

• Organizations under active attack or experiencing a suspected breach
• Enterprises seeking to enhance incident readiness and resilience ahead of events
• Legal, Risk, and Compliance teams requiring forensic-grade evidence
• ISOs and CISOs needing executive assurance and strategic insight post-incident
• Organizations navigating regulatory scrutiny, investor concerns, or high-stakes disclosures
• Insurers, brokers, and legal counsel seeking trusted forensic expertise for their clients

Deliverables

• Preliminary Analysis Report
  • Documented review of the incident situation, including facts to date, threat vectors, required next steps, and recommendations for further response
• Engagement Kickoff and Checklist
  • Organizational IR readiness assessment, contact lists, escalation flow, and breach handling protocols
• Secure Hotline Access
  • Direct, prioritized channel to reach Eristotle’s IR team during a breach scenario
• Readiness Documentation
  • Guidance for logging, incident handling, and data capture recommendations
  • Supports effective response and evidence preservation
• Initial Review Report
  • Summary of readiness posture, known gaps, and recommended improvements
• Executive Briefing Support(as required during active incidents)
  • Guidance for briefing executives, boards, and stakeholders during a live event

End-to-End DFIR Methodology

Eristotle applies a structured, seven-stage methodology tailored to the specific nature, scale, and criticality of each incident:

1. Detection & Scoping
   • Identify signs of compromise
   • Establish incident scope, severity, and affected assets
   • Activate response protocols and mobilize the DFIR team
2. Containment
   • Isolate infected systems and accounts
   • Limit threat actor movement and access
   • Prevent additional damage, data loss, or spread
3. Forensic Imaging & Evidence Preservation
   • Acquire disk, memory, and log data with full chain-of-custody integrity
   • Preserve cloud, endpoint, identity, and network evidence
   • Maintain evidentiary standards for legal and regulatory use
4. Forensic Analysis & Threat Investigation
   • Analyze malware, log activity, communications, persistence methods, and lateral movement
   • Reconstruct attacker actions, tools, and objectives
   • Determine data access, exfiltration, and business impact
5. Threat Hunting & IOC Development
   • Develop and deploy threat indicators to locate additional compromises
   • Proactively search for persistence and latent threats
   • Integrate findings into SIEM, EDR, and broader detection content
6. Eradication & Recovery Support
   • Support secure restoration from backups or clean builds
   • Eliminate footholds, backdoors, and persistence mechanisms
   • Guide hardening and strategic improvements to prevent recurrence
7. Reporting & Post-Incident Review
   • Deliver actionable reports, breach summaries, and legal-ready documentation
   • Facilitate post-incident reviews and lessons learned
   • Translate findings into strategic improvement plans

Why Choose Eristotle?

Our team of globally certified, battle-tested responders brings decades of experience across:

• Host and network forensics: deep investigative expertise across complex environments
• Malware analysis and threat intelligence: identification, attribution, and mitigation of advanced threats
• Sector-specific response: finance, healthcare, defense, technology, public sector, and critical infrastructure
• Regulatory and disclosure support: guidance aligned with GDPR, DORA, NIS2, HIPAA, SEC, and sector-specific obligations
• Cloud, hybrid, and OT environments: modern, legacy, and converged estate coverage
• Peer-level engagement: with executives, boards, regulators, and legal counsel
• Alignment with global standards and frameworks: including NIST SP 800-61, ISO 27035, ENISA, and ISOBOK™

Service Commitment & SLAs

• Initial Triage (Remote): Within 3 hours
• Preliminary Analysis (Remote): Within 24 hours
• Preliminary Analysis (Onsite, if needed): Within 72 hours

The retainer contract:

• Stands valid for one year from date of purchase
• Includes up to 56 hours of effort (proactive + reactive)
• Additional services (remediation, forensic deep-dives, full-scale IR) available under separate SOW

This service does not include:

• Deployment of tools (e.g., SIEM, EDR, endpoint agents)
• Development of incident response plans, playbooks, or runbooks
• Full-scale forensics or post-breach remediation (can be scoped separately)
• Multiple IR events under a single retainer (only one Preliminary Analysis is covered)
• Crisis communications, legal representation, or public relations services
• Ongoing monitoring, detection, or managed SOC services
• These and related capabilities are available through other Eristotle services and can be bundled as part of a broader engagement.

How We Deliver

We provide flexible delivery tailored to the criticality of your incident, onsite, remote, or hybrid. Our engagements begin with a rapid triage and scoping session, after which forensic workstreams are activated. Our global consultants operate with evidentiary rigor and real-world experience, ensuring every aspect of your response is actionable, defensible, and recovery-oriented.

• Rapid Activation
  • Immediate mobilization via hotline or retainer engagement
  • Triage and scoping within hours of notification
  • Deployment of remote forensic and monitoring tooling as needed
• Structured Lifecycle Execution
  • Delivery aligned to the seven-stage DFIR methodology
  • Continuous stakeholder communication and coordination
  • Regular updates, briefings, and decision support for leadership
• Cross-Functional Coordination
  • Integration with internal security, IT, legal, privacy, communications, and executive teams
  • Collaboration with external counsel, insurers, regulators, and law enforcement where required
  • Management of third-party vendors, MSPs, and incident stakeholders
• Evidence-Grade Execution
  • Strict adherence to chain-of-custody and evidentiary standards
  • Forensic-grade tools, processes, and documentation
  • Preservation of data and artifacts for legal, regulatory, and audit use
• Executive and Board Engagement
  • Clear, business-relevant narratives for leadership
  • Support for board, investor, regulator, and customer communications
  • Strategic recommendations aligned to risk, investment, and resilience
• Post-Incident Handover and Continuous Improvement
  • Final reporting, lessons learned, and strategic roadmap
  • Transition of knowledge and tooling to internal teams
  • Pathway into related Eristotle services, IR Retainer, SOC maturity, breach management, to sustain capability uplift

Related Services

Breach Management Capability Maturity Review

Incident Response Retainer

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Forensic & Malware Consultancy