Attack Surface Intelligence (ASI)
Attack Surface Intelligence (ASI) in cybersecurity refers to the continuous process of discovering, analyzing, and managing an organization's entire attack surface. This includes all internet-exposed assets and systems that attackers could potentially exploit.
Key Components of ASI:
Discovery: Identifying all assets, both known and unknown (shadow IT), including IP addresses, domains, subdomains, cloud instances, code repositories, etc.
Inventory: Creating a comprehensive inventory of all discovered assets and their associated attributes (software versions, open ports, configurations, etc.).
Vulnerability Assessment: Analyzing the identified assets for vulnerabilities and weaknesses that attackers could exploit.
Risk Prioritization: Assessing and prioritizing the identified vulnerabilities based on their potential impact and likelihood of exploitation.
Monitoring: Continuously monitoring the attack surface for changes, new vulnerabilities, and emerging threats.
Remediation: Providing actionable insights and recommendations to mitigate identified risks and improve security posture.
Benefits of ASI:
Reduced Attack Surface: Organizations can significantly reduce their overall attack surface by identifying and mitigating vulnerabilities.
Improved Security Posture: ASI helps organizations comprehensively understand their security posture and identify areas for improvement.
Proactive Risk Management: ASI enables organizations to proactively identify and mitigate risks before attackers can exploit them.
Enhanced Visibility: ASI provides complete visibility into all internet-exposed assets, including shadow IT.
Improved Compliance: ASI helps organizations comply with various security regulations and standards.
ASI vs. Traditional Vulnerability Management:
While traditional vulnerability management focuses on known assets and scheduled scans, ASI goes beyond that by:
Continuously monitoring the attack surface for changes.
Identifying unknown and forgotten assets (shadow IT).
Providing an attacker's perspective on the organization's security posture.
Offering actionable insights and recommendations for risk mitigation.
ASI enables organizations to adopt a proactive and thorough stance on cybersecurity by consistently evaluating and minimizing their attack surface, lowering the likelihood of successful cyberattacks.
ThreatNG is a comprehensive platform that addresses many critical aspects of Attack Surface Intelligence (ASI) and goes beyond, offering a holistic approach to external cybersecurity risk management. Here's how its features align with ASI and enhance its capabilities:
1. Comprehensive Discovery and Assessment:
ThreatNG's superior discovery capabilities align perfectly with the core ASI function of identifying all internet-facing assets. Its ability to uncover known and unknown assets, including cloud instances, web applications, and even exposed code repositories, ensures a complete understanding of the attack surface.
The wide range of assessment modules (Domain Intelligence, Social Media, Sensitive Code Exposure, etc.) provides an in-depth analysis of each asset, identifying vulnerabilities and weaknesses across various dimensions. This granular assessment surpasses traditional vulnerability scanning by considering factors like phishing susceptibility, brand damage potential, and ESG exposures.
Real-time monitoring of the attack surface for changes and new threats is crucial for ASI. ThreatNG excels in this area by continuously tracking the digital footprint and alerting on new vulnerabilities, exposed credentials, or emerging threats from its vast intelligence repositories. This proactive approach ensures the organization is always aware of its security posture.
3. Risk Prioritization and Reporting:
ThreatNG's risk scoring and prioritization features are essential for effective ASI. Assigning risk scores based on vulnerabilities' severity and potential impact enables security teams to focus on the most critical threats.
The diverse reporting options (Executive, Technical, Prioritized, etc.) cater to different stakeholders and facilitate informed decision-making. The ransomware susceptibility report, for example, provides specific insights into an organization's resilience against this growing threat.
4. Remediation and Collaboration:
ThreatNG goes beyond identification and assessment by offering remediation guidance. The platform provides actionable insights and recommendations to mitigate identified risks, helping organizations improve their security posture.
Collaboration features like role-based access controls and dynamically generated questionnaires foster efficient communication and coordination among security teams, IT staff, and third-party vendors. This streamlines remediation efforts and ensures everyone is on the same page.
5. Integration with Complementary Solutions:
While ThreatNG offers a comprehensive suite of tools, it can also integrate with other security solutions to enhance its capabilities. For example, it can complement a Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) system by providing external threat intelligence that enriches internal security monitoring.
Integration with threat intelligence platforms (TIPs) can further enhance ThreatNG's knowledge base, providing more context and insights into emerging threats and vulnerabilities.
Examples of ThreatNG's capabilities with investigation modules and intelligence repositories:
Domain Intelligence & Dark Web Presence: By correlating domain information (like exposed APIs or subdomain takeovers) with dark web mentions of compromised credentials or ransomware events, ThreatNG can identify high-risk scenarios and provide early warnings of potential attacks.
Sensitive Code Exposure & Known Vulnerabilities: If ThreatNG discovers exposed code repositories containing API keys or security credentials, it can cross-reference this information with its vulnerability database to assess the potential impact and prioritize remediation efforts.
Cloud and SaaS Exposure & SEC Filings: By analyzing SEC filings for mentions of cloud services and comparing them with its discovery of sanctioned and unsanctioned cloud assets, ThreatNG can identify shadow IT and potential compliance violations.
Social Media & Sentiment Analysis: Monitoring social media for negative sentiment or layoff chatter, combined with financial data and SEC filings, can provide early warnings of potential insider threats or brand damage.
ThreatNG is a powerful solution that encompasses the core principles of ASI and extends them with advanced capabilities like digital risk protection, security ratings, and extensive intelligence repositories. By providing a holistic view of an organization's external attack surface and facilitating proactive risk management, ThreatNG empowers organizations to stay ahead of cyber threats and protect their critical assets.
