Autonomous SOC doesn’t mean auto-remediation
Autonomous SOC should reduce manual work — not remove accountability. Here’s the practical model: agentic triage + planning + evidence, with policy checks and two-tier approvals before execution.
The trap: “autonomous” ≠ “unattended execution”
In security operations, the fastest way to lose trust in automation is to let it take actions you can’t easily explain or roll back. That’s why the safest definition of an Autonomous SOC is:
- Automation handles analysis and planning quickly
- Humans keep control over execution
- Everything stays auditable
The Autopilot pattern
Wazuh OpenClaw Autopilot uses a “proposal + guardrails” approach:
- Agents create cases and propose response plans
- A policy layer validates what’s allowed
- A two-tier approval workflow gates execution
Why two-tier approval matters
Two-tier approvals are a practical compromise between speed and safety. You can adopt it in multiple ways:
- Tier 1: an on-duty analyst approves the plan for execution
- Tier 2: a lead/approver approves high-impact actions (blocking, isolation)
This reduces “oops moments” while still cutting response time dramatically.
Policies are how you encode local reality
Every environment has different risk tolerance. Policies let you define:
- What actions are allowed by default
- What requires elevated approval
- What is never allowed
Evidence packs turn automation into trust
When an auditor asks “why did you block this IP?”, you shouldn’t point to a chat transcript. You should point to a structured evidence pack with a timeline, extracted entities, and the approved plan.
Start small
A good adoption path:
- Deploy Autopilot and enable triage + correlation only
- Measure improved signal-to-noise with metrics
- Enable response planning as “proposal only”
- Turn on approvals and allow a single, low-risk action
Want to try this approach? Start here: