The modern business collects and crunches data to inform executive decisions. Data, though, is useful throughout the organization, not just at the top. As new ways to process and interpret data come about, use cases that once were just dreams are becoming reality. One of the bigger opportunities in this area is how data can tell a story about security or situations in real time.

To get more info about the latest uses for real-time data, John Furrier (@furrier) and John Walls (@JohnWalls21), cohosts of theCUBE, from the SiliconANGLE Media team, visited the Splunk.conf 2016 conference in Orlando, FL. There, they talked with Snehal Antani, CTO of Splunk Inc.

Getting creative with Splunk

The discussion opened with a look at how people have come up with some creative ways to use Splunk. Antani mentioned that Splunk has always been very use-case driven. He also noted that the same data used to run a company in real time is also used by security to catch a breach. The data-analytics software provides an ability to connection the dots and do something about it. This situational awareness is very powerful.

Antani felt there was an issue with just lumping data about as structured or unstructured. He saw the data landscape through a different lens. There’s data in relational databases that is highly normalized. Then, there is the digital exhaust generated from transactions, sensors, web logs and other sources. This may be time-sensitive in nature, but often a company doesn’t know what questions to ask of that data, so they keep it around in case it becomes useful, Antani said.

The social network of security

Cybersecurity is a losing battle. Antani pointed out the cost of an attack is a fraction of the cost to defend from cyber threats. This is unsustainable, he said, and the cost of cyberdefense needs to come down. Collaboration is a strong tool for reducing that price tag. In security, the wisdom of crowds is a huge advantage that can save considerable money.

“Cutting the cost of cyberdefense is the space race of my generation,” he said.

The future, Artani felt, requires that companies fundamentally change the economics of cyber. Data storytelling, too, will be the last mile of data analytics. Finally, the Internet of Things will blur the lines between physical and digital as it becomes a data source for business, he explained.

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE and theCUBE’s coverage of Splunk.conf 2016.

Photo by SiliconANGLE