C-K9
Opinion

The Alert Economy: When Tools Sell Anxiety

November 5, 2025 C-K9 Editorial

Security vendors sell alerts because fear sells better than outcomes.

Modern security tools are incentivized to surface more alerts, not better ones. Severity inflation keeps dashboards red and renewal conversations urgent.

The cost of constant urgency

  • Analyst burnout
  • Missed real incidents
  • Reactive security posture

How to escape the alert economy

  • Define a paging budget
  • Demand reproducible detections
  • Delete alerts without owners