Cyber Security

Vulnerability is closely related to threat and risk because it is a weakness that should be guarded with a strong enough defence, as identified through a vulnerability scan. In an organisation, if no vulnerability management is maintained, identifies, and mitigates security flaws (vulnerabilities), then risky impacts will arrive that can disrupt the sustainability of a system. Once vulnerabilities are identified, security teams must prioritise vulnerabilities based on their effect, often using frameworks like the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) to assess risk levels. This is crucial for effective vulnerability management practices, as not all vulnerabilities pose the same threat level.

Then, did you know the term vulnerability before? Read this article to gain insight into the vulnerability management process and secure your system!

What is vulnerability management?

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO 27002) definition of a vulnerability is “a weakness in an asset or group of assets that one or more threats can exploit”. Every asset is undoubtedly very valuable because it stores many essential things that are sensitive to information. Vulnerability management considers various factors, including the need for regular vulnerability scans to ensure the organisation’s security posture remains secure.

An essential aspect of security management is the implementation of effective vulnerability scans to identify weaknesses—the role of a management system that can maintain the confidentiality of these assets. If you run vulnerability management well, then the sustainability of your organisation will undoubtedly run longer and smoother. On the other hand, you will find many risks and threats if you do not identify vulnerabilities regularly in an organisation’s IT infrastructure, software, and applications, which is essential for maintaining a strong security posture. 

Vulnerability management benefits

Implementing a strong vulnerability management program provides several key benefits that help your organisation achieve its goals and improve its security posture.

Visibility and reporting

One of the biggest challenges in cybersecurity is the lack of visibility over IT assets, vulnerabilities, and security risks, which hinders effective exposure management. Organisations struggle to identify weaknesses and make informed security decisions without clear insights, thus hindering their overall security posture as security professionals often rely on scanning tools for better visibility.

Lack of visibility is caused by many things, such as assets having multiple locations that are difficult to control and modern IT environments, which complicate the traditional vulnerability management approach. With vulnerability management, you will find it easier to handle this common case and have more control to observe and keep assets more secure.

Improved security and control

Every organisation must find the best way and the best solution to avoid the many possible threats in the cyber world. The best solution to overcome the rise of cyber threats is to know various ways to prevent it, including identifying vulnerabilities through a vulnerability scan. Vulnerability management protects risky organisational data, making it more difficult for cyber attackers to reach.

Vulnerability management enforces strict security configurations across all systems, reducing misconfigurations and weak security settings. Moreover, a well-implemented vulnerability management system reduces attack surfaces and strengthens security measures through continuous vulnerability assessments and security patches. 

Operational efficiencies

Cybersecurity isn’t just about protection; it also plays a key role in optimising business operations. Vulnerability management eliminates inefficiencies caused by security incidents, unplanned downtime and manual security checks. Modern vulnerability management tools use AI for cybersecurity and automation to scan systems, generate reports and apply patches, reducing the manual workload for IT teams, which can make them more efficient and deliver tangible benefits to the business. As a result, organisations can quickly identify and address security gaps, reducing response time and limiting the damage from threats. 

How vulnerability management works

Asset discovery and inventory

Organisations cannot effectively manage fragility without knowing what they have in their environment. Asset discovery provides visibility into every hardware, software, and network component with vulnerabilities. They will list their critical assets and categorise their role and importance to the organisation. In this case, fragility can be discovered and acted upon.

Many organisations use automated asset discovery tools that continuously scan networks and systems to identify assets and their configurations. These tools can detect changes or new devices without manual input, ensuring the inventory is always accurate and supporting the organisation’s vulnerability management.

Vulnerability scanners

To find and perform vulnerability management, we must identify and scan the vulnerability in a system to determine the main problem to be fixed. By scanning the assets and components in the system, we can determine if these parts are susceptible and identify exposure management strategies. CVE (Common Vulnerabilities Exposure) database is a catalogue system that lists computer security flaws, which plays a vital role in this purpose.

Patch management

Patch management is one of the efforts or practices of organisations to update software systems to improve performance and security and handle susceptibility in the system. Updating regularly and maintaining system security makes it difficult for cyber attackers to penetrate the system. In addition, patch management also improves functionality and increases system reliability.

Configuration Management

Configuration Management involves establishing, maintaining, and monitoring system configurations across all IT assets (hardware, software, networks), which aims to optimise the configuration to get best practices that are secure and consistent. By performing configuration management, the security of the operating system configuration can be optimised and maintained, enhancing the overall system integrity and supporting the organisation’s vulnerability management efforts. Another benefit of configuration management is that it reduces the risk of vulnerabilities arising from unapproved or accidental changes.

Security incident and event management(SIEM)

Security Incident and Event Management (SIEM) is a strategy that helps organisations identify, monitor, respond to, and manage security incidents and events in real-time, including scanning tools for vulnerability assessments. This system performs analysis by collecting data from various sources, such as firewalls or servers, including logs and security events that can cause vulnerabilities in the system. The main objective of SIEM is to find vulnerabilities in the data and prevent common threats if our system has vulnerabilities.   

Penetration testing

Penetration testing can be defined as simulation attacks used to test your security system and help find any vulnerabilities with penetration testing tools that vary based on your needs. This testing is necessary because it can try to discover your system’s shortcomings, and you can fix it if something needs to be fixed before the attacker attacks your system. Moreover, penetration testing can protect your system from cyber attacks or threats, and good organisations must often carry out penetration testing while updating regularly.  

Threat intelligence

The main way to prevent threats is to know about various kinds of threats and study them to find solutions to avoid them, which involves identifying vulnerabilities through vulnerability scans. The many threats that aim to attack an organisation’s vulnerabilities make us more aware and use threat intelligence to prevent our organisation from becoming the next victim. His intelligence is used to understand threat actors’ tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) and indicators of compromise (IOCs) that can help detect and defend against attacks.

Remediation vulnerabilities

Vulnerability remediation removes a vulnerability if found by monitoring and scanning results, so it will remain secure, emphasising the importance of timely application of security patches. Remediation may involve patching systems, applying configuration changes or other mitigating actions to reduce the risk associated with the vulnerability. One of the most common remediation methods is to apply patches or updates to vulnerable systems or software. A patch regulatory framework helps to ensure that patches are used promptly and that systems are kept up to date. 

What are the differences between a vulnerability, a risk, and a threat?

Vulnerability is a weakness of the organisation that should only be known by internal organisations as part of the risk-based vulnerability management process. If some external parties or parties are less responsible for hacking the information, this is called a threat. Generally, threats in the form of cyberattacks are very prone to occur because they have many ways to realise these goals.

Cyberattacks can endanger vulnerability management because they can exploit cybersecurity vulnerabilities.  This danger is called risk or a very detrimental impact on the company, highlighting the difference between vulnerability and risk management in the context of the organisation’s security posture. The impact of cyber attacks can be in the form of various kinds of losses such as financial losses, loss of important data, disruption of smooth business operations, and damage to the company’s reputation. 

Vulnerability management vs. vulnerability assessment

Vulnerability management and assessment are two cybersecurity practices that are closely related but serve different purposes in protecting an organisation’s IT infrastructure throughout its vulnerability management lifecycle. Vulnerability assessment is a one-time evaluation process. It is designed to identify and measure security risks within a system, network, or application. It involves scanning for vulnerabilities, analysing risks, and generating a report detailing the findings as part of a continuous vulnerability management process.

Meanwhile, vulnerability management is a strategy to protect the vulnerability of the whole organisation by identifying and observing. After the management discovers the vulnerabilities, we must automate the vulnerability assessment to take over it. So, assessment is one part of the vulnerability management lifecycle and cannot be separated from the overall management process. Therefore, although related, they have very significant differences. 

How to manage vulnerabilities

Identify vulnerabilities

Before performing vulnerability management, we must identify system vulnerabilities to optimise. You can use automated tools such as Nessus, Qualys, or OpenVA to scan systems, software, and networks for known vulnerabilities. These tools compare the current configuration and software version with a database of known vulnerabilities (CVE).

Evaluate vulnerabilities

After monitoring and scanning the vulnerabilities, it is also important to evaluate them to determine their potential impact on the system and prioritise remediation efforts effectively, a critical phase of vulnerability management. By evaluating, we can learn how to manage vulnerabilities and the tools that must be used according to our needs and priorities. We can also remediate vulnerabilities with evaluation and then secure the weaknesses of our computer system with stronger defences, utilising software patches where necessary. 

Address vulnerabilities

Once vulnerabilities have been identified and evaluated, they must be addressed or mitigated. Patch management, configuration changes and mitigation are all part of addressing vulnerabilities and applying patches to provide the latest updates to the system and prevent cyber threats or unauthorised access, configuration changes that aim to strengthen the security system, and mitigation or moving vulnerabilities as the last step.

Report vulnerabilities

Reporting vulnerabilities is essential for tracking and communicating the progress of vulnerability management activities and ensuring that all stakeholders, including security professionals, are informed. You can use vulnerability management platforms (Qualys, Rapid7), dashboards, automated reports, ticketing systems, and regulatory compliance reports to easily track the status of vulnerabilities, trends over time, and the effectiveness of remediation efforts.

Frequently Asked Questions

Conclusion

With the increase in cyber-attacks and threats that are very detrimental to organisations, applying vulnerability management is not an option but a necessity for organisations to safeguard all critical information and assets. Vulnerability management is a vital cybersecurity process that ensures organisations stay protected from threats by identifying, assessing, and mitigating security weaknesses. It is an ongoing effort that enhances security, compliance, and business continuity while reducing costs and risks. It is necessary to have optimal vulnerability management to achieve your organisation’s goals with maximum results.