Create user tasks#

Tasks help you make intelligence actionable by creating follow-up actions to specific pieces of intelligence. Tasks enable managing and distributing workload among collaborators, keeping track of progress, and creating workflows to document and drive a operational strategies based on actionable intelligence.

The actions tasks describe can be:

  • A response to acquired knowledge (reactive). For example, a response to a sighting or an incident.

  • A preventive measure to avoid a threat scenario (proactive). For example, to prevent intrusions from a known threat actor.

  • An active hunt to identify potential threats that may affect the organization (predictive). For example, data analysis and penetration testing can help identify potential issues and vulnerabilities before an attack occurs.

In a workspace, to create tasks for users:

  1. In the left navigation bar, go to Workspace Workspaces icon and open a workspace.

  2. Go to the Tasks tab.

  3. Select Create task + in the top left.

You can also create a task through the Tasks Task icon menu. In the left navigation bar, select Tasks Task icon and then:

  • Select + ADD NEW TASK

  • Or, select VIEW ALL TASKS > Create task +

On the Create task view you can enter details and information to clarify what needs to be done, how, who should take care of it, and a due date for the task:

  1. Name: assign the task a short, clear, and descriptive name.

  2. Description: enter a short description of the task to provide an explanation of the task, its goal, and the actions the assigned user should perform to carry it out successfully.

  3. Assigned to: by default, new tasks are automatically assigned to the current user. From the drop-down menu select a different user avatar to assign the task to another user. You can also start typing a user name in the search box to filter only user names containing your input string. The selected user becomes the owner of the task.

  4. Stakeholders: click , and then from the drop-down menu select one or more stakeholders sponsoring the task. For example, a team leader or a project manager. You can also start typing a user name in the search box to filter only user names containing your input string.

  5. Due date: click anywhere on the input field to display a calendar where you can select a deadline for the task.

    Note

    Time and date use the UTC time standard.

  6. Guidance angle: include requirements, guidelines, and recommendations to instruct the task owner about what needs to be done and why. Providing an explanation of the expectations or the desired goals along with a rationale helps avoid miscommunication and misinterpretation. You can also add pointers to any relevant reference or context.

  7. Workspaces: from the drop-down menu select one or more workspaces to associate the task to.

  8. Entities: click Add or More to insert new rows or input fields, as necessary, where you can input additional entities. The selected entities are the objects of the task activities.

    On the entity search pop-up dialog, type a search string into the search field or select one or more checkboxes corresponding to the entities you want to associate with the task.

    Use the context filters to narrow down the pool of available entities to specific entities based on or more selection criteria. You can combine filters to drill down into, for example, a specific entity type ingested from a specific source in a given date range, and included in a specific dataset.

    Generic searches can yield noisy results, whereas very specific searched may yield no results. You can refine the displayed results by specifying a search string in the filter input field.

    Alternatively, click one of the available filter options to select and filter by specific:

    • Entity types

    • Source

    • Date

    • Datasets

    • TLP

    • Reliability

    When you are done, click Select to add them to the task.

  9. To store your changes, click Save; to discard them, click Cancel.

    To access additional save options, click the down arrow on the Save button:

    • Click Save and new to save the current data or configuration for the item you are working on, and to create a new item of the same type right away.

      For example, a new dataset, feed, policy, rule, task, or workspace.

    • Click Save and duplicate to save the current data for the item you are working on, and to create a new prepopulated copy of the same item, which you can use as a template or a blueprint to speed up repetitive manual work.