External Threat Landscape Management
External Threat Landscape Management (ETLM) in cybersecurity is the ongoing process of continuously monitoring, analyzing, and understanding the external threats and risks that could potentially impact an organization's security posture. It involves gathering intelligence about potential attackers, their tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), and the broader threat landscape to proactively defend against emerging threats.
Think of it as having a dedicated team of analysts constantly scanning the horizon for potential storms (cyberattacks) that could damage your organization. They gather information about the types of storms, their intensity, and potential paths to help you prepare and protect yourself.
Here's a breakdown of the key aspects of External Threat Landscape Management:
Threat Intelligence Gathering: Collecting information about potential cyber threats from various sources, such as open-source intelligence (OSINT), threat intelligence platforms, and industry reports.
Threat Analysis and Assessment: Analyzing the collected threat intelligence to identify potential risks and vulnerabilities specific to the organization. This includes assessing the likelihood and potential impact of different threats.
Threat Monitoring and Prediction: Continuously monitoring the threat landscape for changes and emerging threats. This may involve using automated tools and threat intelligence platforms to stay ahead of potential attacks.
Vulnerability Management: Identifying and mitigating vulnerabilities in the organization's systems and applications that could be exploited by attackers.
Incident Response Planning: Developing and regularly testing incident response plans to ensure that the organization is prepared to handle security incidents effectively.
Security Awareness Training: Educating employees about potential cyber threats and best practices to reduce the risk of human error and social engineering attacks.
Why is External Threat Landscape Management important?
Proactive Security Posture: ETLM enables organizations to take a proactive approach to security, anticipating and mitigating threats before they can cause damage.
Informed Decision-Making: Provides valuable insights for making informed decisions about security investments, risk management, and incident response planning.
Improved Threat Detection and Response: Helps organizations improve their threat detection and response capabilities by understanding the latest attacker tactics and techniques.
Reduced Risk of Cyberattacks: By staying ahead of emerging threats, organizations can reduce their overall risk of falling victim to cyberattacks.
Enhanced Cybersecurity Awareness: Educates the organization about the evolving threat landscape and the importance of cybersecurity best practices.
In today's dynamic threat landscape, External Threat Landscape Management is essential for organizations of all sizes. It enables them to make informed decisions about their security strategy, proactively defend against emerging threats, and strengthen their overall cybersecurity posture.
ThreatNG can effectively manage and mitigate External Threat Landscape Management procedures by:
External Discovery: ThreatNG automatically discovers and maps an organization's internet-facing assets, including websites, subdomains, cloud services, and more. This provides a complete view of the organization's external technical attack surface, crucial for identifying potential entry points for external attacks.
External Assessment: ThreatNG assesses the discovered assets for vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, and security risks, helping identify weaknesses that attackers could exploit. ThreatNG's assessment capabilities include:
Evaluating the susceptibility of web applications to hijacking, subdomain takeover, BEC and phishing attacks, brand damage, data leaks, and ransomware.
Assessing exposure to cyber risks, ESG risks, and supply chain and third-party risks.
Providing detailed breakdowns of findings for each assessment. For example, the Web Application Hijack Susceptibility assessment analyzes the parts of a web application accessible from the outside world to identify potential entry points for attackers.
Analyzing the website's subdomains, DNS records, SSL certificate statuses, and other relevant factors in the Subdomain Takeover Susceptibility assessment.
Deriving the BEC & Phishing Susceptibility assessment from Sentiment and Financials Findings, Domain Intelligence, and Dark Web Presence.
Reporting: ThreatNG generates detailed reports on the external attack surface, vulnerabilities, and security ratings. These reports help organizations understand their security posture and prioritize remediation efforts.
Continuous Monitoring: ThreatNG continuously monitors the external attack surface for changes and new threats, helping organizations stay ahead of emerging risks.
Investigation Modules: ThreatNG provides in-depth investigation modules for domains, social media, sensitive code exposure, cloud and SaaS exposure, online sharing exposure, sentiment and financials, archived web pages, dark web presence, and technology stack. These modules help analyze potential attack vectors and identify specific threats.
Intelligence Repositories: ThreatNG leverages intelligence repositories on the dark web, compromised credentials, ransomware events and groups, known vulnerabilities, ESG violations, bug bounty programs, SEC Form 8-Ks, and Bank Identification Numbers. This threat intelligence helps organizations understand the broader threat landscape and proactively defend against external attacks.
ThreatNG can also work with complementary security solutions like vulnerability scanners, firewalls, and intrusion detection systems, further enhancing an organization's security posture.
Examples of ThreatNG Helping:
ThreatNG helped a financial institution discover a subdomain takeover vulnerability on one of its forgotten marketing websites, preventing a potential phishing attack.
ThreatNG helped a healthcare organization identify sensitive patient data exposed on a misconfigured cloud storage bucket, preventing a potential data breach.
Examples of ThreatNG Working with Complementary Solutions:
ThreatNG integrates with a vulnerability scanner to provide detailed vulnerability assessment reports on internet-facing assets, helping organizations prioritize remediation efforts.
ThreatNG integrates with a firewall to provide real-time threat intelligence, helping the firewall block malicious traffic and prevent attacks.
