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Security Operations · Foundational

Resource Consumption

An indicator of malicious activity shown by unusual CPU, memory, disk, or bandwidth usage.

Definition

Unexplained spikes can signal cryptojacking, DDoS participation, data staging, ransomware encryption or exfiltration. Baselines of normal utilization make anomalies identifiable. Monitoring tools and SIEM alerts on thresholds help detect it.

Example

A database server's outbound bandwidth spikes to ten times normal at 3 a.m.

Exam tip

Compare against a baseline; resource consumption alone is not proof of compromise.

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