What is the purpose of a SIEM system?

• A. To provide firewall functionality.
• B. To back up data regularly.
• C. To analyze security events for threat detection and incident response.
• D. To provide antivirus scanning.

Answer: (D)

The main purpose of a SIEM system is to analyze security events from across the network to detect threats and coordinate incident response. It gathers logs and event data from devices, servers, endpoints, and applications, normalizes formats, and applies correlation rules to uncover suspicious sequences that indicate attacks or policy violations. When something notable is found, it generates alerts with rich context—such as the affected asset, user, time, and related events—so security teams can investigate quickly and respond effectively. SIEMs also provide dashboards and reporting for ongoing visibility and compliance, and they help with forensic analysis to understand how an incident unfolded. This is different from firewall functionality (which controls traffic), regular data backups (which preserve data), or antivirus scanning (which protects endpoints from malware).