Which activity does incident analysis most prominently include?

Incident analysis is a crucial component in understanding and responding to incidents effectively. It primarily focuses on investigating and dissecting the events that occurred during a security incident to ascertain what happened, when it happened, and how it occurred. By diagraming a timeline of activity, analysts can visualize the sequence of events leading up to the incident, during the incident, and any follow-up actions taken. This method allows for a clearer understanding of the incident's progression and helps identify patterns or specific moments that are significant for analysis.

Creating a timeline is instrumental in pinpointing the cause and discovering any gaps in security measures that could be addressed to prevent future incidents. It also provides a framework for stakeholders to follow, making it easier to communicate findings and recommendations.

The other activities listed may support the incident management process but do not encompass the primary focus of incident analysis in the same way. For example, verifying the integrity of restored data is more about ensuring recovery efforts were successful, receiving intrusion detection system (IDS) alerts pertains to real-time detection rather than post-incident analysis, and reverse engineering typically involves dissecting malware or systems to understand their function but does not directly involve analyzing the overall incident timeline. Therefore, diagramming a timeline is the most prominent activity in incident analysis, capturing