How Does Managed Detection and Response (MDR) Work?

EDR is the technology layer — it collects endpoint telemetry and generates alerts. MDR wraps that technology with a 24/7 human SOC team who investigate alerts, confirm genuine threats, and take containment action on your behalf. Without MDR, your own staff must triage every alert, which most SMEs lack the capacity to do. 43% of UK businesses experienced a breach or attack (DSIT 2025), and many lacked the monitoring to detect it promptly.

The SOC analyst validates the alert, determines severity, and initiates containment — typically isolating the affected endpoint within minutes. They then investigate the root cause, assess the scope of compromise, and provide remediation guidance. This rapid response is critical because 19,000 UK businesses were hit by ransomware in 2025 (Sophos), and the difference between a contained incident and a full outbreak often comes down to response speed.

Yes. MDR providers deploy lightweight agents on endpoints and integrate with existing platforms such as Microsoft 365, firewalls, and cloud services. The MDR service ingests logs and telemetry from these sources to build a unified view of threats across your environment. 22% of breaches involved compromised credentials (Verizon DBIR 2025), and MDR correlation across identity, email, and endpoint data is what catches these multi-stage attacks.