In today's high-stakes cybersecurity landscape, it’s not about if threats exist—they do. The real question is: will you detect them before they cause damage?
That’s where Extended Detection and Response (XDR) platforms come in. They’ve emerged as a critical solution for unifying detection, investigation, and response across all layers of the modern security stack.
Unlike traditional endpoint-focused tools, XDR solutions extend visibility across your entire digital ecosystem—from endpoints and networks to cloud workloads and mobile devices. But here’s the truth: an XDR platform is only as effective as the integrations it supports.
The real strength of XDR lies in its ability to connect with diverse systems such as ingesting data, correlating events, and automating response across your environment. So, whether you're building, evaluating, or enhancing your XDR strategy, these are the 10 must-have integrations that will determine how fast, comprehensive, and effective your threat response truly is.
Let's break them down.
1. Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR):
Endpoints are where many threats start and create a lot of damage. EDR provides deep visibility into endpoint activity, allowing for granular monitoring of processes, file analysis, and rapid response actions like isolating compromised devices.
Integrating EDR into XDR brings rich endpoint telemetry & it’s crucial for
- Detecting malware and lateral movement
- Automating isolation and remediation
- Adding real-time endpoint context to XDR
2. Network Detection and Response (NDR):
This comes crucial for integration, as it provides deeper network visibility into network traffic, flow data and anomalous network behavior. Additionally, it provides behavior-based threat detection across east-west and north-south traffic.
Integrating with NDR allows an XDR platform’s ability to detect
- Lateral movement
- Data Exfiltration
- Command-and-control activity
3. Identity and Access Management (IAM):
Identity is the new battleground and XDR integration with IAM is crucial for detecting.
- Unauthorized access attempts
- Unusual login behaviors
- Privilege escalations
- To detect credential-based attacks
- Crucial for zero trust architectures
- Support MFA enforcement and policy control
79% of organizations suffered identity-related breaches in the last two years.
4. Threat Intelligence Platforms:
What is a detection without context? Threat intelligence provides context on the latest threats, attack techniques, and Indicators of Compromise (IOC).
Threat intelligence enriches your alerts with external data—IP addresses, domains, file hashes, and attack patterns seen in the wild. Additionally, it
- Boosts accuracy of detections
- Helps prioritize threats based on real-world risk
- Supports proactive threat hunting
5. Cloud Security Platforms:
Moving workloads to public cloud platforms can increase the risk of visibility gaps. Integrating with cloud-native security tools helps for real-time visibility into cloud workloads, storage activity, configuration drifts, IAM policies, and anomalous access patterns.
These integrations help detect insider threats, unauthorized access, and policy violations—before they escalate into breaches.
- Detect misconfigurations, unauthorized access, and insider threats
- Ingest logs from AWS, Azure, GCP, and containers
- Complements traditional on-prem coverage
6. Vulnerability Management Tools:
Detecting vulnerabilities is not enough, as you need to understand the one posing the actual risk. Integrating XDR with VM tools can correlate active threats with known vulnerabilities and prioritize accordingly.
- Contextualize alerts with known vulnerabilities
- Helping security teams prioritize remediation efforts
- Identify attacks targeting unpatched systems
7. Email Security:
The most common entry point for attackers is email. Most common email-borne threats were Phishing, business email compromise (BEC), and malware delivery, where XDR platform should monitor closely.
According to a new report from PhishMe “91% of cyberattacks start with a phishing mail.”
Integrating with email security solutions helps for
- Detecting and remediating phishing at the source
- Correlating user clicks with endpoint activity
- Automating quarantine and response
8. IT Service Management (ITSM) / Ticketing Systems:
Alerts can easily slip through the cracks without integrating with ITSM or ticketing platforms. XDR should be able to create, assign, and update tickets based on detection workflows.
Integration with ITSM or ticketing systems:
- Creates and updates incident tickets
- Supports closed-loop incident management
- Ensures accountability and tracking
- Aligns security with IT operations
9. Firewalls
Firewalls are still frontline defenders. Integrating with them helps XDR platforms see, block, and respond at the perimeter. It extends the XDR platform's ability to detect and contain threats by incorporating data from a primary network security control point.
Here's how firewall integration enhances an XDR platform:
- Enriches Threat Context
- Tracks traffic anomalies and suspicious connections
- Expands Detection Capabilities
- Automates and Accelerates Response through blocking malicious IP addresses
10. Asset Discovery
You can't protect what you can't see. Integrating with asset discovery gives XDR platforms, full visibility into what's in your environment—devices, apps, cloud resources, and ownership.
Without a comprehensive and continuously updated inventory of assets, an XDR platform operates with significant blind spots, hindering its ability to accurately detect, investigate, and respond to threats.
Here's why asset discovery is crucial for XDR:
- Complete Visibility of the Attack Surface
- Improved Vulnerability Management and Risk Prioritization
- Enhanced Threat Hunting
- Automated Response and Policy Enforcement
Final Thoughts:
An XDR platform is only as effective as the data it can ingest, correlate, and act upon. These top 10 integrations allow your platform to move beyond isolated alerts—to become a true security nerve center capable of acting with speed, intelligence, and context.
If your XDR doesn’t integrate well, it doesn’t respond well.
Don't just settle for detection but demand extended detection and response that integrates across your entire digital landscape.
The Sacumen Connector Marketplace includes 250+ prebuilt connectors across diverse categories like IAM, EDR, and more designed to accelerate your integration efforts and time-to-market. To learn more about our connectors, explore our marketplace.