What is a Federated Data Model?
A Federated Data Model is an architecture in which a security platform queries data directly from existing sources, SIEM, EDR, identity provider, email gateway, cloud, through read-only APIs, without ingesting, normalizing, or storing the data in a central repository.
Updated 2026-05-19
Federated approaches contrast with ingestion-based architectures, where data is copied into a vendor's storage tier. Ingestion creates three problems: cost (paying twice for the same data), latency (data must arrive in the new store before queries can run), and lock-in (changing platforms means migrating data). Federated approaches solve all three but require sophisticated cross-source query orchestration to deliver the same investigation depth as ingestion-based platforms.
How Command Zero handles Federated Data Model.
Command Zero connects to existing data sources via read-only APIs and runs investigation questions directly against them. No ingestion. No data migration. No new storage. The customer's data stays where it lives. Investigations complete in seconds because the queries are scoped to the question, not the full data corpus. Deployment finishes in under one hour because no data needs to be loaded before the platform is operational.
Frequently asked questions
What is a Federated Data Model in security?
It is an architecture where the platform queries your existing data sources directly through read-only APIs, instead of ingesting and storing copies of your data. The data stays where it lives.
How is a Federated Data Model different from a SIEM?
A SIEM ingests and stores logs and charges by data volume. A Federated Data Model queries the source at investigation time, so there is no ingestion cost, no duplicate storage, and no migration. Command Zero connects to the SIEM rather than replacing it.
Does querying data in place make investigations slower?
No. Because queries are scoped to the question rather than scanning a full corpus, results come back in seconds. It also removes the lag between data being generated and being available that ingestion pipelines introduce.
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