Articles | Open Access | https://doi.org/10.55640/ijdsml-05-02-04

AI-optimized SOC playbook for Ransomware Investigation

Prassanna R Rajgopal , Cybersecurity Leader, Industry Principal, Infosys Ltd, North Carolina, USA

Abstract

In today’s fast-evolving threat landscape, ransomware attacks have become more sophisticated, faster, and more destructive leaving traditional Security Operations Center (SOC) response strategies struggling to keep pace. Traditional SOC workflows struggle to match the speed and complexity of modern ransomware attacks. Manual processes like alert triage, incident scoping, and containment often consume critical hours giving adversaries ample opportunity to encrypt data, exfiltrate assets, and demand ransoms. AI-optimized SOC playbooks are redefining this paradigm by automating the entire investigation lifecycle. Leveraging machine learning, LLMs, and real-time telemetry analysis, these systems rapidly identify high-fidelity threats, enrich alerts with contextual intelligence, and scope incidents with minimal analyst input reducing response time from hours to mere minutes.

Generative AI further accelerates this shift by auto-generating attack summaries, mapping indicators to known threat tactics, and recommending or initiating containment actions such as isolation or credential revocation. These playbooks evolve continuously by learning from analyst feedback and past events, improving both accuracy and efficiency over time. The result is a measurable reduction in mean-time-to-detect (MTTD) and mean-time-to-respond (MTTR), while empowering SOC analysts to focus on strategic analysis over repetitive triage. As ransomware campaigns grow faster and more autonomous, adopting AI-driven SOC playbooks has become a mission-critical step for organizations seeking proactive, resilient security operations.

Keywords

AI-optimized playbooks, Security Operations Center (SOC), Generative AI in Cybersecurity, Explainable AI (XAI), Mean-Time-to-Detect (MTTD), Mean-Time-to-Respond (MTTR), Mean-Time-to-Understand (MTTU), Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs), Large Language Models (LLMs), MITRE ATT&CK framework

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AI-optimized SOC playbook for Ransomware Investigation. (2025). International Journal of Data Science and Machine Learning, 5(02), 41-55. https://doi.org/10.55640/ijdsml-05-02-04