IT organizations have evolved far beyond their traditional support role to become pivotal drivers of business success. By maintaining efficient and secure operations, these teams can give their organizations a competitive edge, supporting the delivery of higher-quality products and services at reduced costs.
One of IT’s most critical responsibilities is protecting organizations from both known and unknown vulnerabilities. While known risks like phishing and social engineering attacks can be addressed through established strategies, unknown risks present a unique challenge. These unforeseen threats can emerge without warning, potentially disrupting operations and compromising sensitive data. For any organization serious about data protection, operational continuity, and regulatory compliance, addressing both types of vulnerabilities is essential.
Known Vulnerabilities: The Basics
Known vulnerabilities are exactly what they sound like – security weaknesses that have been publicly disclosed. These vulnerabilities are typically discovered in one of two ways: either by the product vendors themselves or by third-party researchers examining applications, devices, and open-source components.
When product developers discover a vulnerability, they usually follow a standard process: issue a patch or update, then notify customers about the security fix in the new release. Third-party researchers generally follow “responsible disclosure” practices, privately reporting issues to vendors or open-source project maintainers. This gives development teams time to fix the code before public disclosure, which can come through release notes, project discussion threads, or formal Common Vulnerability and Exploit (CVE) listings in the National Vulnerability Database (NVD).
The Disclosure Divide: Commercial vs. Open Source
Commercial and open-source software handle vulnerability disclosures differently. Commercial vendors, bound by license agreements, are obligated to provide updates during the license period. These updates are automatically pushed to licensed users regularly. IT teams then evaluate whether new features are needed and schedule appropriate updates. However, if teams overlook the security aspects of these updates, critical patches might not receive the priority they deserve.
Open-source software takes a different approach. Since it’s freely available for download and use, open-source communities can’t track who’s using their code. Instead of pushing updates automatically, they rely on a “pull” model. Organizations must actively monitor their open-source components, track community updates or NVD listings, and manually download and install updates.
The scale of vulnerability disclosure is significant – over the past decade, NVD has published more than 190,000 vulnerabilities across commercial and open-source software.
The Race Against Time
Known vulnerabilities present a particular challenge because cybercriminals are well aware of them and understand that many organizations struggle to maintain consistent patching schedules. The situation is complicated by the availability of exploit tools on sites like exploit.db. While these resources help security professionals understand risks and implement defenses, they can also arm malicious actors with tools to exploit vulnerabilities before patches are applied.
Managing Known Vulnerability Risks
The sheer volume of annual vulnerability disclosures can overwhelm IT and security teams, especially in organizations where IT handles both infrastructure and security. These teams must juggle multiple responsibilities: maintaining infrastructure, supporting users, and managing the complex cycle of tracking, evaluating, prioritizing, and patching software.
Larger organizations with dedicated security teams often invest in vulnerability scanners. These tools automatically identify security weaknesses like outdated software or misconfigurations across computer systems, networks, and applications. They generate detailed reports highlighting vulnerabilities and their severity levels based on NIST’s Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS), helping teams prioritize their response. However, running these scanners effectively requires both security expertise and sufficient bandwidth to manage scans, interpret results, and filter out false positives.
Streamlining Defense with Defendify
For many organizations, a vulnerability scanning service offers a more practical solution than managing dedicated scanning resources internally. Defendify’s Vulnerability Scanner, for example, automates both scanning and mitigation recommendations, freeing internal teams to focus on other critical tasks.
The service automatically scans both external and internal assets – including servers, workstations, and IoT devices – and generates comprehensive reports highlighting vulnerabilities and remediation steps. Setup is straightforward: IT teams simply provide target IP address ranges. Defendify sets itself apart by using AI and machine learning to assess risk and recommend contextual prioritization.
This automated approach to identifying and prioritizing known vulnerabilities across various assets makes Defendify’s Vulnerability Scanner a valuable tool for organizations looking to strengthen their cybersecurity posture.
Ready to enhance your organization’s security? Contact us today to learn how we can help your team stay ahead of emerging threats.
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