You are tasked with integrating a new security tool that uses WebSockets for real-time event streaming and requires persistent authentication (e.g., long-lived tokens). Cortex XSOAR needs to consume these events, process them, and potentially push actions back to the tool.
Which of the following combination of XSOAR features would be necessary to build this real-time, bi-directional integration, and what advanced considerations are paramount for its stability?
A. Necessary: Generic Webhook for event reception, and standard 'HTTP Request' commands for pushing actions. Considerations: Webhooks are pull-based, not suitable for real-time streaming; HTTP is stateless and not persistent.
B. Necessary: A custom Python integration leveraging a WebSocket library (e.g., websockets or socket io) to maintain a persistent connection and handle real-time event parsing. Integration commands would be exposed for sending actions back. Considerations: Implementing robust error handling for connection drops, re-authentication mechanisms for token expiry, and managing concurrent connections if the tool supports multiple streams.
C. Necessary: XSOAR's out-of-the-box 'Log Collector' for event ingestion, and a generic 'Execute Command' task to send actions. Considerations: Log collectors typically consume files or syslog, not WebSockets; 'Execute Command' is not bi-directional for a stream.
D. Necessary: Using XSOAR's 'Polling' mechanism to repeatedly query the tool's REST API for new events, and 'Playbook Task' to push actions. Considerations: Polling is not real-time; the tool's API might not expose events for polling.
E. Necessary: XSOAR's 'Feed' integration for consuming events, and 'Incident Fields' for pushing actions. Considerations: Feeds are for static data ingestion, not real-time, bi-directional communication.
Explanation:
Option B is the only viable approach for integrating a WebSocket-based real-time event stream. XSOAR's core strength lies in its extensibility. A custom Python integration would be required to leverage a Python WebSocket library to establish and maintain a persistent connection to the security tool. This integration would act as a listener, parsing incoming events and creating XSOAR incidents or updating existing ones. It would also expose commands that the playbook could use to send actions back over the WebSocket. The advanced considerations (error handling for disconnections, reauthentication, managing concurrency) are critical for the stability and reliability of such a real-time integration, which is much more complex than standard REST API calls.
Options A, C, D, and E either use inappropriate XSOAR features or fundamentally misunderstand how WebSockets work.