Incident Response
Incident Response
Cyber incidents don’t follow a 9-to-5 schedule. When ransomware hits, when accounts are compromised, when data starts leaving the network – every minute the attack continues, the cost goes up. SA1 Solutions provides rapid incident response, isolating the threat, recovering your systems and giving you a clear picture of what happened – fast.
We don’t just restore operations and walk away. Every response includes root cause analysis, hardening recommendations and lessons learned — so the same attack doesn’t succeed twice.
Types of Incidents We Handle
Ransomware Attack
Ransomware encrypts your files and demands payment to restore access – often spreading laterally across networks within hours. When it hits, our team isolates affected devices immediately, identifies the variant, restores from clean backups where possible, and traces the entry point to prevent it happening again. We do not advise paying ransoms – payment funds future attacks and offers no guarantee of recovery.
Business Email Compromise (BEC)
An attacker gains access to an executive or finance account and uses it to send fraudulent payment requests or invoice scams – one of the highest-cost incident types for UK businesses. We lock down the compromised account, audit recent emails sent in your name, work with your bank on payment recovery where possible, and notify external parties who may have received fraudulent messages.
Phishing Compromise
An employee clicks a malicious link or shares credentials with an attacker impersonating a trusted source. We immediately reset the affected account, enforce MFA, audit the account’s activity since compromise, search for any further compromised accounts, and review what data may have been accessed.
Account Takeover
An attacker has gained access to a user account – often admin or executive – and is impersonating that user or escalating privileges. We force sign-out across all sessions, reset credentials, enable MFA, audit recent activity for changes made or data accessed, and review for backdoors or persistent access mechanisms.
Data Breach or Exfiltration
Sensitive data – customer records, financial information, intellectual property — has been accessed or removed from your systems by an unauthorised party. We identify exactly what data was accessed, determine the scope and timeline, preserve forensic evidence, support ICO notification requirements (mandatory within 72 hours under UK GDPR), and assist with customer and regulatory communications.
Malware Infection
Malicious software – trojans, spyware, keyloggers, cryptojackers – has been installed on one or more systems without authorisation. We isolate infected machines, identify the malware family and capabilities, determine the entry point, clean or rebuild affected systems, and search for related infections across the rest of your estate.
Cloud Account Compromise
An attacker has gained access to your Microsoft 365, Azure or Google Workspace tenant – often the most damaging incident type given the breadth of access involved. We identify the scope of access, lock down compromised admin accounts, audit changes made (mailbox rules, MFA bypasses, new admins), search for persistence mechanisms, and harden the tenant against re-entry.
Suspected Compromise (No Confirmed Incident)
You think something might be wrong – unusual login alerts, strange behaviour, employee reports – but no confirmed attack yet. We run rapid triage to determine if it’s a genuine incident, perform threat hunting across your environment to find indicators of compromise, and either confirm clean status or escalate to full incident response.
Our Incident Response Process
A structured six-step approach to containing, investigating and recovering from cyber incidents – keeping businesses operational when attacks happen.
STEP 1 - Preparation
Effective incident response starts long before an incident happens. We build response playbooks tailored to your environment, define escalation paths, configure detection and logging, and ensure backups are ready and tested – so when an attack lands, we already know exactly what to do.
STEP 2 - Detection and Analysis
When suspicious activity is detected, our team analyses the alert immediately – confirming whether it’s a genuine incident, identifying the type of attack, and assessing the scope. The faster we determine what we’re dealing with, the faster we can contain it.
STEP 3 - Containment
Once confirmed, our priority is stopping the spread. We isolate affected devices, block malicious traffic, disable compromised accounts and apply emergency controls to prevent lateral movement – buying time to investigate without the attack getting worse.
STEP 4 - Eradication
With the threat contained, we remove it. Malware is cleaned or systems rebuilt from clean images, attacker persistence mechanisms are eliminated, compromised credentials are rotated, and exploited vulnerabilities are patched – closing every door the attacker used.
STEP 5 - Recovery
We restore your systems to normal operation in a controlled way – bringing services back online from verified-clean backups, monitoring for any signs of residual threat, and confirming that business operations can resume safely.
STEP 6 - Post-Incident Review
Every incident is a learning opportunity. You receive a clear, jargon-free report covering what happened, how it was contained, what data was affected, and specific recommendations to prevent recurrence. We also handle ICO notification support and cyber insurance documentation where required.
Why Welsh Businesses Choose SA1 for Incident Response
Rapid, Reliable Response
When an incident hits, every minute matters. Our team responds within minutes, not hours – containing threats before they spread, isolating affected systems and getting your business back to operational as fast as possible. No call centres, no offshore handoffs, no waiting for “the right person” to come on shift.
Expertise and Experience
Your incident response team is based in Swansea – not offshore, not outsourced. We’re on the ground, on UK time, working with UK regulators and UK cyber insurance providers. When you need someone you can actually call during a breach, that’s us.
Minimised Downtime and Costs
Every hour a cyber incident goes unresolved costs you – in lost revenue, broken customer trust, and recovery expenses that grow with each passing minute. Our rapid containment and structured recovery process is designed to compress incident timelines and limit financial impact.
Comprehensive Documentation and Insights
Every incident response includes a clear, jargon-free report covering what happened, how it was contained, what data was affected and specific recommendations to prevent recurrence. Reports are formatted to support cyber insurance claims, ICO notification obligations and board-level briefings.
Proactive Improvement
Cyber incidents often trigger regulatory reporting obligations under UK GDPR – including 72-hour ICO notification for personal data breaches. We support your compliance throughout the response, document the incident in the format insurers require, and ensure nothing falls through the cracks during a high-pressure situation.
Have You Been Breached?
Don’t wait. Every minute a cyber attack continues, the damage grows. Our incident response team is ready to help businesses across Swansea, Cardiff and South Wales – call us now.
Office hours line — out-of-hours emergency response available
Contact us today
Contact SA1 today to find out more information about how we can manage help your organisation become more protected.