As new and more complex security threats continue to surface, organizations increasingly need complete visibility across their entire IT environment to proactively address potential vulnerabilities.
Full IT transparency is integral to cybersecurity as it enables organizations to assess the relative risk of potential vulnerabilities and devise a remediation plan proactively. Therefore, it is crucial for companies to regularly analyze their digital assets, ensuring they maintain hardened end-to-end security processes across all networks, devices, and platforms.
Organizations need a proactive solution that identifies security threats, protects critical IT assets and safeguards sensitive information. However, robust vulnerability management is challenging, especially for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) with time constraints and budgetary restrictions.
This is where the need for managed vulnerability scanning comes into play.
Let's review vulnerability scanning and a few benefits to ensure your business understands how this service improves your ability to detect advanced cyber threats.
What is Vulnerability Scanning and Management?
Layered cybersecurity strategies are incomplete without vulnerability scanning and management. Organizations that fail to proactively remediate the security gaps within their IT environment present malicious actors with an opportunity to gain unauthorized access to systems and sensitive information.
Managed vulnerability scanning is a cybersecurity service that utilizes industry-leading software, vulnerability scanners, automated penetration testing, and other tools so that organizations can identify, track, evaluate, minimize and eradicate security risks within their network and external sources.
Vulnerability scanning services are typically managed by highly trained cybersecurity professionals and often implemented alongside other cybersecurity tactics. With managed vulnerability scanning, cybersecurity experts identify vulnerabilities, evaluate their risk, and guide corrective actions to remediate security risks over time. A comprehensive solution will also include:
- Comprehensive threat assessments
- Advanced network monitoring tools
- Network-layer and application-layer penetration testing
- Enterprise-level antivirus and email filtering protection
- Data-driven reports and specific recommendations to support business continuity and compliance
4 Stages of Vulnerability Management
To ensure your business comprehends the full scope of vulnerability scanning services, here is a brief overview of the four stages of vulnerability management.
1. Identification - Reliable scans are conducted to accurately identify rogue devices, misconfigured software, coding bugs, and other potential paths to sensitive data that attackers can exploit.
2. Classification - Once vulnerabilities are identified, the degree of risk they pose is evaluated and logically organized into actionable groups, focusing on the highest risk areas in the environment. Classification helps guide decisions on how to treat the identified vulnerabilities best.
3. Remediation - After classification, the security risk is fixed by applying patches, removing software, changing configurations, and updating devices.
4. Mitigation - The final stage creates a mitigation strategy that includes actionable steps to reduce the potential risk of exposure moving forward. Reports of vulnerabilities are generated to improve future security responses. A mitigation strategy may include:
- A next-generation firewall
- A multi-factor authentication solution
- An integrated cybersecurity platform
Benefits of Managed Vulnerability Scanning
There are many advantages of having vulnerability scanning, primarily when managed by experienced cybersecurity service providers. They leverage their expertise and industry-leading technology to provide proactive detection and unrivaled protection against the latest cybersecurity threats.
Here are a few critical benefits of vulnerability scanning services.
- Improve control
- Enable vulnerability prioritization
- Minimize attack surface and eliminate security gaps
- 24/7 threat visibility across the entire IT environment
- Meet compliance, governance, and data protection requirements
- Boost operational efficiency with repeatable and automated scanning
- Receive actionable remediation guidance
- Reduce strain on internal IT departments
Identify Security Threats and Reduce Risk with Managed Vulnerability Scanning
Businesses need to take a proactive stance in ensuring their continuity and safeguarding their sensitive information. Rather than ad-hoc scanning, a managed, coordinated, and long-term approach to vulnerability scanning benefits organizations far more and will help them identify
and actively remediate critical areas of susceptibility, ensuring protection from the continuously evolving cyber threat landscape.
Organizations interested in reducing their attack surface should get in touch with a cybersecurity specialist to discuss implementing managed vulnerability scanning services that will help identify critical areas of vulnerability and remediate issues before they impact your bottom line.
