Endpoints are always a target for threat actors. They serve as potential entry points to the overall network, meaning an attack that starts on a single endpoint can quickly spread across an organization’s attack surface. And they are notoriously difficult for security teams to successfully protect. The makes and models of endpoints vary widely, as does the operating system, the apps or programs installed on them, and the security habits of each endpoint user. The rise of hybrid work has increased these challenges, as endpoints have become more portable – and more exposed – than ever before.
In fact, 70% of breaches originate from endpoints like laptops, desktops, and mobile devices, according to the 2024 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report. Even when an attack doesn’t start on an endpoint, it doesn’t mean it won’t reach one, or multiple, during different stages of an attack. Ransomware, for example, commonly replicates and spreads laterally through a network, infecting as many endpoints as possible to disrupt an entire organization. Similar malware strains, known as worms, follow the same pattern.
That’s why endpoint security is so foundational to cybersecurity. Monitoring and securing the array of endpoints throughout your environment allows you to prevent many common threats and detect advanced threats as early as possible, stopping them before they go from isolated compromises to network-wide security incidents.
What Is Endpoint Security?
Endpoint security is the practice of securing computing devices, as well as an umbrella term for a large subset of technologies with varying approaches to how they protect, detect, and respond to security events on endpoint devices.
The primary goal of endpoint security is to protect endpoints from a range of cyber threats including malware, such as ransomware, and many other threats like phishing and unauthorized access. Unlike older security approaches that focused mainly on defending the network perimeter, modern endpoint security recognizes that not only has the concept of a single, hardened network perimeter faded away with the rise of cloud computing, but also that many enterprise endpoints exist beyond the protections of a traditional network perimeter.
Indeed, as technology advances, the very definition of an endpoint is changing, as new types of network-connected devices have emerged as essential to modern business operations.
The Modern Definition of an Endpoint
Today, an “endpoint” is best defined by the very words that make up the term. An endpoint is any device that resides at the “end point” of a network connection, physical or otherwise, and can communicate on said network. This offers a much broader, more reflective definition that includes devices beyond just desktops and laptops, including servers, virtual machines, mobile devices, Internet of Things (IoT) technology, operational technology (OT), and more.
This definition is also beneficial when we look at the current threat landscape, and how attackers are breaching organizations. Threat actors have shown themselves capable of leveraging any device from the above list to breach an environment and execute malicious activity. If we limit what we consider an endpoint to just traditional computers, then we risk missing essential activities that can help an organization detect a potential incident. A successful approach to endpoint security is one that includes visibility into any device that can transmit and receive data on your network.
Why is Endpoint Security Important?
Most security incidents will land on the endpoint at some phase of the attack. Be it the root point of compromise, where a threat actor has gained access to a laptop; or the middle of an attack, where a threat actor has exploited a vulnerability to access mobile devices; or even the late stages of a malware attack, where a strain has exploded across multiple endpoints. It’s these scenarios that make endpoint security so important to any tech stack and overall strategy.
Additionally, the strength of perimeter security has drastically weakened in the age of “bring your own device” and “work from anywhere.” If a user is taking a laptop out of the office or remotely logging into an IoT device from a mobile phone, the importance of security on those endpoint devices increases.
According to the IBM Cost of a Data Breach 2024, having endpoint detection and response (EDR), a leading category of endpoint security solution, in place can reduce the cost of a breach by $185,533 (USD), highlighting its value.
Benefits of endpoint security include:
- When fully deployed, it protects all endpoints within a network or organization
- It helps secure devices in an age of hybrid and remote work
- It offers more sophisticated threat protection, detection, and response
- It protects users’ identities or credentials which may be present on an endpoint, now a major target for threat actors
- Protects the valuable data, operational functions and access points to a broader network an endpoint offers.
The Evolution of Endpoint Security
Over the past several decades, endpoint security has transformed dramatically to keep pace with the evolving cyber threat landscape and the increasing complexity of IT systems. In the beginning, endpoint protection mainly consisted of simple antivirus programs installed on individual devices. These early solutions relied on signature-based detection methods that identified malware by matching files against a known threat database. Although effective initially, this technique quickly became insufficient as cybercriminals developed more advanced attacks exploiting new vulnerabilities.
As organizations grew their networks and embraced internet connectivity, the frequency and variety of cyber threats increased. This development prompted the introduction of more sophisticated security measures such as firewalls, intrusion detection systems, and centralized management of endpoints. However, the emergence of mobile devices, cloud services, and remote working expanded the definition of endpoints and challenged established conventions regarding how to secure them. The traditional on-premises security perimeter model struggled to address the challenges presented by increasingly decentralized IT environments.
To address these changes, endpoint security evolved into a more adaptive and integrated approach. Technologies like endpoint protection platforms (EPP) and endpoint detection and response (EDR) solutions appeared, providing continuous monitoring, automated threat detection and response, and forensic investigation capabilities. This allowed security teams to rapidly identify and contain threats before they could spread widely.
Today, modern endpoint protection leverages artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to identify previously unseen malicious and anomalous activity based on behavior analysis. Additionally, zero trust models, which require ongoing verification of devices and users, are becoming central to endpoint security strategies. As cyber threats grow more targeted and complex, endpoint security continues to advance toward more layered, intelligent, and responsive capabilities.
Types of Endpoint Security Solutions
Most endpoint security in use today falls under the banner of “next-gen,” which, in this context, has come to mean any endpoint tool that goes beyond traditional antivirus.
According to the 2025 Arctic Wolf Trends Report, 84% of organizations surveyed are currently utilizing next-generation endpoint security solutions, and 49% of organizations are using more than one. This duplication is due to any number of reasons, such as a wide variety of endpoint types to secure, overlapping or redundant vendor contracts (often due to merger and acquisition activity), or varying security policies and requirements across business units and geographies.
Let’s take a closer look at the major next-gen endpoint security solutions organizations are turning to today.
Endpoint Detection and Response
Endpoint detection and response (EDR) was developed as a response to the drawbacks of traditional antivirus, which included the inability to detect never-before seen threats, or threat actors using techniques designed to thwart traditional endpoint security.
Instead of running point-in-time scans as most antivirus products were designed to do, EDR records critical activity that occurs on an endpoint and stitches those activities together to identify behaviors. Process executions, command line activity, running services, network connections, and file manipulation are just some of the events that EDR tools are designed to record.
While signature-based detection remains, many EDR vendors also include a series of analytics that run across recorded actions to identify behaviors deemed suspicious or malicious. Although the tactics, techniques, and procedures used by attackers constantly change, the actions and behaviors of attackers often fall into familiar behavioral patterns.
This is where the “detection” part of EDR comes in. When a suspicious or malicious activity or pattern occurs, the EDR agent installed on the endpoint will trigger an alert, a notification that can take any number of forms – email, chat message, or ticket in an IT service management system – to let security professionals know that something potentially malicious has been detected. Historically, one of the challenges of EDR systems has been the “noise” or excessive number of alerts they trigger, often for benign reasons. However, contemporary EDR solutions have not only improved their ability to alert only on important detections, but also now allow for in-depth alert tuning, enabling each organization to customize the conditions under which the EDR tool triggers an alert.
Also, EDR includes features that allow the security professional to take a variety of actions, individually or automatically, once a detection occurs on the endpoint. This is the “response” capability of EDR, and these features vary by vendor. In addition to basic investigation features, most EDR agents include the ability to terminate processes, delete files, and isolate the host system from the rest of the network, both as-needed or under preestablished conditions, such as a malware infection. The idea is that if the host is infected, isolating the machine will prevent threats from propagating to other systems and give the security team the opportunity to investigate and remediate the situation without risking further damage to the environment. If the endpoint is being remotely manipulated by a threat actor, for example, isolating the machine will terminate their connection and prevent them from pivoting deeper into the network.
Beyond the isolation capability, some vendors offer more advanced response options, including orchestration and automation. Response orchestration enables a set of specific, pre-determined actions to take place under a specific circumstance. For example, if a suspicious file is detected, the EDR can be configured to run a set of orchestrated actions, such as checking the file hash against various threat intelligence sources and sending it for dynamic file analysis before reporting the results back to the security team. Furthermore, EDR can typically support fully automated remediation. Some security teams rely on this feature to accelerate the response if predefined conditions are met. Using the host isolation example above, some organizations automate the process of isolating a host when malware is detected.
Endpoint Protection Platforms
Although EDR drastically improves on the limitations of antivirus, it is not without drawbacks of its own. One of the primary complaints related to EDR is that it can’t automatically prevent every possible threat. By design, because some endpoint attacks are designed to mimic or hide among legitimate business activities, EDR records the actions taking place on the endpoint and triggers an alert when suspicious activity meets a certain threshold.
But detection alone does not guarantee that the threat is mitigated. EDR traditionally places threat resolution decisions on human analysts, where limited security staff, alert fatigue, and other factors could result in critical detections going unaddressed.
To combat this drawback, endpoint protection platforms (EPP) were developed to build off what was seen as the best aspects of both EDR and antivirus. These products monitor the endpoint for known-bad activity and use a variety of detection approaches including signature-based detection, machine learning, and host-based intrusion prevention. When a detection is confirmed, the EPP agent will intervene and prevent the threat from executing.
The Benefits of Endpoint Security Solutions
Endpoint security solutions provide comprehensive protection against malware, ransomware, phishing, and unauthorized access. With hybrid work here to stay, securing endpoints with modern solutions offers a variety of essential benefits for organizations and their users:
Data Collection and Exploration
- Endpoint visibility and activity data
- Forensic-grade log collection
Threat Detection and Response
- Suspicious activity detection
- Malware
- Fileless threats (memory-based infections)
- User behavioral analysis
- Identity-related threat patterns
- Alert triage / incident investigation
Response Actions
- Contain / uncontain endpoints
- Terminate / suspend processes
- Terminate / suspend process trees
- Log out users
- Create forensic data packages
Which Endpoint Security Solution is Right for You?
Determining which endpoint solution is right for your environment is often a difficult decision to make.
The needs and limitations of every organization are unique and should be considered when purchasing an endpoint solution. EPP is often seen by large enterprises as an outdated approach to securing endpoints, but smaller environments or those companies that are just beginning to develop their security program may find that they are only able to afford and manage EPP at the beginning. Although it may not have the same capabilities as more advanced tools, it is still better than no security on your endpoints.
EDR is an excellent choice for organizations that desire top-tier state-of-the-art endpoint security solutions. While a customer organization must be staffed with trained, experienced security professionals who are capable of managing deployment, configuration, and alert management, as well as incident investigation and response, the broad-based set of threat prevention and detection capabilities are necessary to protect organizations from the broad range of current and emerging endpoint attacks. Plus, the large amount of recorded activity also offers the additional benefit of a dataset that your analysts can use for threat hunting exercises.
Unfortunately, organizations with limited security staff and/or budget may find EDR overwhelming or simply out of reach. Indeed, as many organizations have learned the hard way, a detection that was not responded to is just as bad as no detection at all.
EPP, on the other hand, may be the best choice for an organization with a limited security staff that is looking to proactively prevent endpoint threats. By automating the prevention of endpoint threats, even though it detects a more limited set of malicious activity, EPP takes the burden off security and IT teams. Though it is important to note that this can result in some environments lowering their prevention thresholds, resulting in occasional endpoint security incidents that may require special attention.
Learn more about Aurora Endpoint Security from Arctic Wolf, and discover how our market-leading AI-driven prevention, detection, and response can stop threats before they disrupt your business.
Ready to go beyond the endpoint? Discover the major attributes, benefits, and challenges of leading security solutions in Understanding the Lines Between EDR, NDR, MDR, and XDR.