By Eleanor Barlow, SecurityHQ

The purpose of Vulnerability Management is to ensure that organisations can accurately detect, as well as classify and contextualise vulnerabilities, within their organisation, and act on them to reduce the chances of a successful attack by exploiting the vulnerability.

With Vulnerability Management, once vulnerabilities are detected and prioritised, remediation programmes are then put in place to ensure patch management and compliance. The process works on a 24/7 basis, so that analysts are always monitoring the network for new vulnerabilities.

Key Challenges with Vulnerability Management

There are three key issues with supporting inhouse vulnerability management.

First, it often lacks the discipline needed, and the patch management involved, as a team is not usually dedicated to the process. Frequently, the task is pushed onto the IT department who already have their own workload and rarely have the skillset to conduct Vulnerability Management sufficiently.

Second, without the right number of analysts, or the analysts with the right skillset, organisations habitually lack the comprehensive visibility and ability to adequately analyse threats, which puts them at a greater risk.

Third, businesses are financially insensitive to the Vulnerability Management process and do not dedicate the right resources, both in terms of technology, people, and time. This means that vulnerabilities are missed, which leaves businesses open to attack.

Who Needs Vulnerability Management?

No matter the industry or size, all organisations need to have a Vulnerability Management process that provides them with the ability to detect weaknesses within their IT estate. This is necessary to know the risk levels of weaknesses, so that the right actions can be made. This is also a great way to know the order of priority when it comes to patching. You need to be able to analyse threats and the risk exposure, to know what your key concern is, and act on it swiftly in the right order. You don’t want to leave the greatest threat to be patched last.

What Your Vulnerability Management Should Give You

Successful Vulnerability Lifecycle Management means that you can access and prioritise vulnerabilities to reduce the risk of intrusion, exploitation, and data breaches.

Analysts should be able to provide complete visibility of IT assets, perform scans and analyse vulnerability data to offer advice on vulnerability remediation priority to remediate risks.

Outsourcing Vulnerability Management Checklist

If you are outsourcing Vulnerability Management to an MSSP, make sure that the service includes the following:

• Auditable collaboration.
• Accurate vulnerability mitigation prioritisation to identify key areas of concern/risk.
• Intelligent analytic reporting for taking informed decisions.
• Precise and applicable synopsis with carefully crafted reports provided on a regular basis.
• Dedicated team who specializes in Vulnerability Management.
• A team that is available 24/7, every day of the year, with round the clock support for scheduling, monitoring, and reporting on scanning activities. These need to be people not automations!
• The ability to identify as well as map all risk level to specific threats.
• Access to labs and the right intelligence to support advisories.

Vulnerability management not only increases a healthy cyber security posture of your business, but it also means that stakeholders have visibility and an understanding of your business attitude towards cyber security. This, in turn, can support ROI, by unleashing the full potential of the technology investments made.

For more information on Vulnerability Management, download data sheet here.

Or, to speak with an analyst, contact the team here.

About SecurityHQ

SecurityHQ is a Global MSSP, that detects, and responds to threats, instantly. As your security partner, we alert and act on threats for you. Gain access to an army of analysts that work with you, as an extension of your team, 24/7, 365 days a year. Receive tailored advice and full visibility to ensure peace of mind, with our Global Security Operation Centres. Utilize our award-winning security solutions, knowledge, people, and process capabilities, to accelerate business and reduce risk and overall security costs.

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Author– Eleanor Barlow

Eleanor is an experienced named author and ghost writer, who specialises in researching and reporting on the latest in cyber security intelligence, developing trends and security insights. As a skilled Content Manager, she is responsible for SecurityHQ’s content strategy. This includes generating and coordinating content for the latest articles, press releases, whitepapers, case studies, website copy, social accounts, newsletters, threat intelligence and more. Eleanor holds a first-class degree in English Literature, and an MA from the University of Bristol. She has strong experience writing in B2B environments, as well as for wider technology-based research projects.