Audience: SOC Analysts, Threat Intelligence Analysts, Security Operations Leaders
Product Module:Threat Intelligence Management (ThreatQ Platform)
Last Updated: December 18, 2025
KB ID: KB‑20251218‑ThreatQ‑Scoring‑Expiration
Tags: Threat Intelligence, Lifecycle Management, Scoring, Expiration, Indicator Management, ThreatQ, SOC Operations
Problem
Organizations often ingest large volumes of threat intelligence but still experience security gaps, alert fatigue, and false positives. Without a way to prioritize and retire data, threat intelligence becomes noisy instead of actionable.
Objective
Help security teams understand how scoring and expiration can be used to manage the full threat intelligence lifecycle—from ingestion to retirement—so analysts can focus on intelligence that is relevant, timely, and aligned with business risk.
Step‑by‑Step Solution
1. Birth: Choose the Right Intelligence
Effective threat intelligence starts with careful source selection. Ingesting every available feed often introduces noise and reduces confidence in decisions.
Best practices:
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Evaluate feeds before full ingestion by reviewing sample data.
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Prefer sources that provide context, not just raw indicators.
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Limit ingestion to indicator types and formats you actually use.
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Mark new indicators as Review to allow human validation before activation.
Expected result:
Higher‑quality intelligence enters the platform with reduced noise from the start.
2. Life: Prioritize with Scoring
Every organization has a unique threat landscape shaped by industry, geography, infrastructure, and risk appetite. Generic threat scores often fail to reflect this reality.
Key concepts:
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Scoring should emphasize relevance, not just severity.
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Customer‑defined scoring allows teams to align intelligence with business priorities.
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Context such as geography, industry targeting, internal telemetry, and incident response artifacts should influence scores.
Examples:
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Windows‑specific malware may be low priority in a Linux‑only environment.
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Adversaries targeting a different industry or region may warrant reduced scores.
Expected result:
Analysts can filter and act on the most relevant indicators while suppressing low‑value data.
3. Manage Indicator Statuses Beyond Active and Expired
Not all indicators should immediately block or alert downstream systems.
Common status options:
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Review – Awaiting analyst validation
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Active – Approved for detection or blocking
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Indirect – Useful for investigations but not enforcement
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Whitelisted – Known‑good artifacts protected from activation
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Custom statuses – Such as detection‑only or passive monitoring
Expected result:
Greater control over how intelligence is operationalized and reduced risk of self‑inflicted outages.
4. Retirement: Expire Data Strategically
Threat data loses value over time as adversaries change infrastructure and tactics. Retaining all indicators indefinitely strains systems and increases false positives.
Why expiration matters:
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Infrastructure such as IPs and domains can be re‑used legitimately.
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Hash‑based indicators decay quickly due to polymorphism.
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Old intelligence burdens downstream security controls.
Expected result:
Only actively relevant indicators remain enabled for detection and protection.
5. Retain Context After Expiration
Expiration does not mean deletion. Historical intelligence retains value for investigations, threat hunting, and attribution.
Use cases:
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Reviewing historical logs during incident response
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Tracking long‑running or recurring adversary campaigns
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Avoiding duplicate research when infrastructure reappears
Expected result:
Expired indicators no longer cause alerts but remain available for context and analysis.
6. Ongoing Review and Optimization
Threat intelligence programs should evolve as the business and threat landscape change.
Recommendations:
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Regularly review scoring logic and thresholds
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Track false positives and true positives by source
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Reassess feed value and relevance periodically
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Adjust expiration and retention policies as data volume grows
Expected result:
A sustainable intelligence lifecycle that adapts over time.
Verification Checklist
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☐ New feeds are reviewed before full activation
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☐ Scoring reflects business relevance and risk
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☐ Expiration policies reduce stale indicators
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☐ Historical context is retained for investigations
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☐ Scoring and retention rules are reviewed regularly
Call to Action
Review your current scoring and expiration policies to ensure your threat intelligence reflects your environment—not a generic risk model.
Engage with your TAM to make sure your data controls are working for you, today - not the version of your business 6 months ago.
Review the white paper on the ThreatQ Indicator Lifecycle in more detail.