Sophos MTR vs Security as a Service. What’s the difference?
What is Sophos MTR?
Sophos MTR Standard or Managed Threat Response, provides 24/7 threat hunting, detection, and response capabilities delivered by an expert team as a fully managed service. What that means is a dedicated team at Sophos will monitor your environment and act on any threat detections using the EDR technology that we are a massive fan of here at Planet.
IT is offered as an optional service add-on with Sophos Intercept X Advanced with EDR.
Sophos MTR Advanced goes one step further and will actively go looking for potential threats. It proactively improves your security by recommending configuration changes and reporting on vulnerabilities.
How does Planet IT’s Security as a Service (SECaaS) compare with Sophos MTR?
Let me start off by saying that Sophos MTR is a fantastic service, there is no denying that. But you do have options should you want this protection but want to explore different avenues.
Here at Planet IT, we offer an alternative service that will give you the peace of mind of MTR, while being more aware of the fact that many of you will have technologies outside of the Sophos stack.
Alongside this we know that for many of our customers the biggest risk is always the recovery and with Sophos MTR there is quite rightly an end to where Sophos can provide services. With SECaaS we stick with you and can support you to the bitter end.
I have compared the offerings of Sophos MTR with Planet IT’s Security as a Service (SECaaS) in the table below:
| Feature | Sophos MTR | Planet IT SECaaS |
| 24/7 support | ✓ | Office Hours |
| Dedicated Account Manager | ✓ | ✓ |
| Direct Call-In Support | ✓ | ✓ |
| Asset Discovery via Endpoints | ✓ | X |
| Enhanced Telemetry via Endpoints | ✓ | X |
| Activity Reporting | Sophos Only | All Security Vendors |
| Periodical Health Checks | Sophos Only | All Security Vendors |
| Vulnerability Scanning | Sophos Only | All Security Vendors |
| Firewall Support | Sophos Only | All Security Vendors |
| Completely mitigate through to completion | Sophos Only | All Security Vendors |
| Penetration Testing | X | ✓ |
| Windows Updates | X | ✓ |
| Phishing Training & Testing | X | ✓ |
| Email Protection | X | ✓ |
| Cyber Essentials / Plus | X | ✓ |
Verdict
Sophos MTR is a great service if you are a large organisation with the requirement for 24/7 support and have the resources to afford it. If you have an internal IT team in place to work in collaboration with Sophos to completely remediate any threats, it really is a top solution.
However, as you can see above Planet IT’s SECaaS offering is more than sufficient to give you the peace of mind you need. We will work with you to recommend and provide the solutions right for your business and support you until any threat is mitigated, no matter what security products you use.
Add in our other services such as Windows Updates as a Service, Vulnerability Scanning (not just for Sophos products) / Penetration Testing and Cyber Essentials as a Service, you can rest assured that SECaaS will keep you safe and updated as much as possible!
About Adam Harrison
My name is Adam, and I am a security-focused Technical Architect. It is my job to provide expert advice on security solutions and assist our customers with protecting their environment from viruses, ransomware, and other nasty attack vectors! My background is in Security as a Service, Infrastructure and Helpdesk Support; I keep myself up to date with the latest threats and security products, so you don’t have to!
If you want to talk to me about how Sophos Intercept X with EDR would fit into your business then please call 01235 433900 or you can reach out to me via DM or at architecture@planet-it.net.
