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Continuous Vendor Monitoring

Threat NG Staff

Continuous Vendor Monitoring (CVM) in cybersecurity is the ongoing process of assessing and managing the security risks associated with your organization's third-party vendors. It's like keeping a constant pulse on the security health of your vendors to ensure they are meeting your security standards and not introducing undue risk into your environment.

Here's a breakdown:

Why it's crucial:

  • Dynamic Risk Landscape: The cybersecurity threat landscape is constantly evolving. New vulnerabilities are discovered, attack methods change and vendors' security postures can shift over time. CVM helps you stay on top of these changes and proactively address emerging risks.

  • Beyond Initial Assessments: Traditional vendor risk assessments provide a snapshot of a vendor's security at a specific time. CVM goes beyond this by providing continuous visibility into its security posture, allowing you to detect and respond to real-time changes.

  • Early Problem Detection: CVM helps identify potential issues before they escalate into significant security incidents. By continuously monitoring key security indicators, you can detect anomalies like a sudden increase in vulnerabilities, leaked credentials, or suspicious activity that might suggest a compromise.

  • Maintaining Trust and Compliance: CVM helps ensure that your vendors consistently meet your security requirements and comply with relevant regulations. This helps maintain trust in your vendor relationships and reduces the risk of legal or financial penalties.

How it works:

  • Automated Monitoring: CVM leverages computerized tools and technologies to continuously collect and analyze data about your vendors' security posture. This includes data from public sources (e.g., security ratings, threat intelligence feeds, news articles) and potentially data shared directly by the vendor.

  • Key Performance Indicators (KPIs): CVM tracks key security metrics, such as the number of vulnerabilities, patch frequency, security incidents, and compliance certifications. These KPIs provide insights into the vendor's security performance over time.

  • Real-time Alerts: CVM systems generate alerts when significant changes or anomalies are detected in a vendor's security posture. This allows security teams to investigate and respond to potential issues quickly.

  • Continuous Improvement: CVM is not just about identifying risks; it's also about driving continuous improvement in your vendors' security practices. You can encourage them to strengthen their security controls and reduce overall risk by providing feedback and collaborating with vendors.

Benefits of Continuous Vendor Monitoring:

  • Reduced risk: Proactive identification and mitigation of vendor-related risks.

  • Improved security posture: Ensuring vendors meet your security standards.

  • Enhanced compliance: Demonstrating due diligence in managing third-party risk.

  • Increased efficiency: Automating vendor risk management processes.

  • Better vendor relationships: Collaborating with vendors to improve security.

Continuous Vendor Monitoring is a crucial component of a robust third-party risk management program. Organizations can strengthen their security posture and protect their valuable assets by continuously assessing and managing vendor-related risks.

ThreatNG appears well-suited to facilitate Continuous Vendor Monitoring (CVM). Here's how its features and capabilities align with the core principles of CVM:

1. Automated Monitoring:

  • Continuous Monitoring: ThreatNG offers constant monitoring of the external attack surface of vendors, automatically collecting and analyzing data from various sources. This includes scanning for vulnerabilities, exposed assets, and changes in security posture.

  • Domain Intelligence: The Domain Intelligence module provides deep insights into a vendor's domain security, including DNS health, SSL certificates, exposed APIs, and known vulnerabilities. This data is continuously updated, providing an ongoing assessment of the vendor's security hygiene.

  • Dark Web Presence: ThreatNG actively monitors the dark web for mentions of vendors, including any discussions about security incidents, data breaches, or vulnerabilities. This real-time intelligence provides early warnings about potential vendor compromises or emerging threats.

  • Sentiment and Financials: By continuously analyzing news articles, SEC filings, and social media, ThreatNG can assess changes in a vendor's financial stability, legal standing, and reputation. These factors can indirectly impact a vendor's security posture and are essential for CVM.

2. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs):

  • Security Ratings: ThreatNG generates comprehensive security ratings that quantify various aspects of a vendor's security posture, including web application security, subdomain security, BEC & phishing susceptibility, data leak susceptibility, and overall cyber risk exposure. These ratings serve as valuable KPIs for tracking vendor security performance over time.

  • Supply Chain & Third-Party Exposure: ThreatNG calculates explicitly a supply chain and third-party exposure score, providing a dedicated KPI for monitoring vendor risk.

  • Customizable Risk Configuration and Scoring: ThreatNG allows organizations to customize risk configurations and scoring to align with their risk tolerance and priorities. This enables tracking KPIs most relevant to the organization's unique needs.

3. Alerts:

  • Continuous Monitoring: ThreatNG's constant monitoring capabilities enable the detection of significant changes or anomalies in a vendor's security posture. This triggers real-time alerts, notifying security teams of potential issues that require immediate attention.

  • Integration with Existing Security Infrastructure: ThreatNG can integrate with existing security information and event management (SIEM) systems or other security tools to enhance real-time alerting and incident response capabilities.

4. Continuous Improvement:

  • Collaboration and Management Facilities: ThreatNG provides collaboration tools and dynamically generated questionnaires to facilitate vendor communication and coordination. This enables organizations to share security assessments, provide feedback, and work with vendors to improve security practices.

  • Reporting: ThreatNG generates various reports that can be shared with vendors, providing them with insights into their security posture and areas for improvement. This fosters transparency and collaboration in the pursuit of continuous improvement.

Complementary Solutions and Examples:

  • Third-Party Risk Management Platforms: Integrating ThreatNG with dedicated third-party risk management platforms can further enhance CVM by combining ThreatNG's data with additional risk indicators and scoring models.

  • Vulnerability Scanners: Integrating ThreatNG with vulnerability scanners can provide more in-depth vulnerability assessments of vendors, contributing to a more comprehensive CVM program.

Examples:

  • Monitoring Critical Vendors: ThreatNG can continuously monitor critical vendors' security posture, such as those that handle sensitive data or provide essential services. This helps ensure that these vendors maintain a high level of security and do not introduce undue risk to the organization.

  • Contractual Compliance: ThreatNG can be used to track vendor compliance with contractual security obligations. Organizations can ensure that vendors meet their agreed-upon security standards by continuously monitoring security ratings and KPIs.

By leveraging its continuous monitoring, comprehensive security assessments, real-time alerts, and collaboration features, ThreatNG empowers organizations to implement effective Continuous Vendor Monitoring programs. This helps organizations maintain a strong security posture, reduce third-party cyber risk, and build a more resilient and secure ecosystem.