Functional Assets and Pillars
Every stage of our digital presence threat R&D adheres to the mantra of “Security Centric; Not Security Exclusive”. From identifying a new threat to the rollout of a new capability, we document, analyze, categorize, and provide guidance as to how external digital assets affect their respective internal functions. We classify and identify these external digital assets as Functional Assets and internally as Functional Pillars across the following areas: Technical, Strategic, Operational, and Financial. These assets and their impact on an organization are further analyzed, measured, and communicated according to what we identify as the Digital Presence Triad (Feasibility, Believability, and Impact).
Visibility
As we encounter new digital asset types in our R&D efforts, we determine their respective levels of revelation and exploitation:
Revelatory of Sensitive, Proprietary, and/or Secret Information about People, Places, and Things (brands, products, and services)
Exploit for further reconnaissance, obtain access to resources, gain access, elevate privileges, and/or evade defenses.
Insight
All findings are analyzed to see if they are practical/realistic/accessible/sensible (Feasible), trustworthy/reasonable/timely (Believable), and how they affect change in performance/experience/relationships (Impact) across the Functional Pillars of Technical, Strategic, Operational, and Financial.
Management
Every digital asset has a correlating Functional Area of impact across the pillars (Technical, Strategic, Operational, and Financial). Therefore, it is an R&D requirement to investigate, communicate, improve, and build upon our capabilities to identify and manage findings across functional areas and break down the silos. Our knowledgebase development efforts are focused on facilitating contextual evidence-based investigations for efficient cross-departmental collaboration and management of digital presence findings.
Functional Areas
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Technical
Applications, Services, and IT Infrastructure
Unpatched vulnerabilities, coding inconsistencies, and application/infrastructure misconfigurations all present opportunities for adversaries to gain access, evade defenses, and escalate privileges into an organization. Not to mention opportunities to attack its respective ecosystem of partners, customers, and supply chain.
Technical assets include IT Infrastructure (On-Premise, Cloud, IoT Entities, Network, Servers, and Folders/Files) and Services/Applications (Domains, Subdomains, Certificates, Email Addresses, Archived Web Pages, Portals, Login Pages, and Online Text/Public Code Repositories).
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Strategic
Industry/Trade/Market Behavior and Reputation
All organizations should have an inventory of all Strategic assets available online. Mismanagement of Strategic assets can lead to issues in security (eg. Social Engineering Attacks), brand/reputation management (eg. Inconsistencies and Non-Compliance), and business operations.
Strategic assets consist of information about an organization's business strategy (market research/studies, list of acquisitions, strategic plans), sales/marketing operations (org charts, collateral, contracts, alliances, surveys), and social network presence.
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Operational
People (Employees and VIPs), Places (Real Estate, Offices, Factories, etc.), and Things (Materials, Supplies, and Products)
Operational assets should be closely monitored as mismanagement can lead to risks in sensitive data exposures, technical threats to the organization (and third parties), and risks to the overall infrastructure.
Operational assets are concerned with business operations (R&D, IT, environmental, social, and governance), legal workings (contracts, disputes, intellectual property, blacklists), and human resources (compensation and employment contracts).
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Financial
Monetary Markets, Structures, and Transactions
Mismanagement of Financial digital presence can lead to issues ranging from fraud to non-compliance with industry/regulatory regulations. Overexposure or leaks are also possible through these assets that can be leveraged and exploited by adversaries against an organization.
Financial assets encompass the monetary markets, structures, and transactions of an organization. Assets within this pillar would include financial systems, statements (internal and external), management reports, business plans, financing information, and tax documentation.