Centralizing Your Threat Exposure Visibility In One Place

Modern cybersecurity functions staffed with only a handful of analysts and engineers rely on more than 10+ tools to manage their IT infrastructure and security. Most of these tools, mainly scanners, produce large amounts of data such as logs, alerts, and reports, each contributing to the cybersecurity puzzle. It’s not uncommon for most organizations to have a separate scanner for each asset type (e.g. code, container, cloud, web app, etc.). Operating multiple tools to their full capacity is challenging enough, but the real issue arises from the disparate data they generate, leading to a fragmented view of the organization’s threat landscape. This fragmented perspective not only complicates proactive threat prevention and vulnerability management, but also hinders effective incident response. In light of this complexity and data fragmentation, centralizing threat exposure visibility in one place becomes an imperative solution for modern cybersecurity. In this blog post, we’ll explore the reasons why.

What Is Threat Exposure Visibility?

Threat exposure includes all the risks and vulnerabilities that an organization’s IT infrastructure faces from various cyber threats. Achieving threat exposure visibility means having a comprehensive understanding and continuous monitoring of assets by way of four crucial types of intelligence: asset intelligence, vulnerability intelligence, threat intelligence, and compensatory controls. 

Asset intelligence involves cataloging all organizational assets, such as hardware and software and assessing their criticality to business operations. Vulnerability intelligence focuses on identifying and evaluating weaknesses within these assets. And threat intelligence entails the ongoing analysis of the dynamic threat landscape, including emerging cyber threats, attack techniques, and threat actors that are most applicable to the business context at hand.

By effectively integrating these four forms of intelligence, organizations can create a comprehensive threat exposure view, allowing them to proactively identify and mitigate security gaps and vulnerabilities, thus reducing the risk of successful cyberattacks. This is the hopeful outcome when we resolve the ‘scattered data dilemma’.

Exploring The Scattered Data Dilemma

The “scattered data dilemma” refers to the significant challenge faced by cybersecurity professionals when critical threat and vulnerability data are spread across multiple disparate tools and platforms. This dilemma arises from the difficulty of effectively consolidating, correlating, and analyzing scattered data sources, hindering the ability to gain comprehensive insights into an organization’s security posture and increasing the risk of undetected vulnerabilities and cyber threats.

To put this into context, picture your security team confronting scattered threat, asset and vulnerability intelligence from various consoles, akin to searching for puzzle pieces in different rooms of a darkened house. Just as locating the pieces poses a challenge, assembling them into a coherent picture to proactively combat threats becomes an even greater struggle, all while looming cyber actors eager to compromise remain unseen in the shadows.

Due to the ‘scattered data dilemma’, cybersecurity analysts and engineers have limited visibility as data spreads across platforms, making it hard to detect critical threats. Operational efficiency suffers due to the management of numerous tools, leading to delays in threat responses. The complexity grows with more tools, resulting in potential misconfigurations and vulnerabilities. Furthermore,  the overall approach to cybersecurity results in reactive threat response instead of proactive threat prevention, increasing the risk of significant damage during security incidents.

Impact on Risk-Based Vulnerability Management and Cyber Resilience

Risk-based vulnerability management focuses on identifying and mitigating vulnerabilities based on their potential impact on the organization. The ‘scattered data dilemma’ significantly affects this practice, particularly in vulnerability prioritization. The dispersion of data across various tools and platforms hampers the proper correlation of asset, threat, and vulnerability intelligence, making it challenging to assess the criticality of assets, identify emerging threats, and prioritize vulnerabilities effectively.

Operational inefficiency, stemming from managing multiple tools, adds complexity to the process. Security teams struggle to navigate disparate interfaces and data sources, leading to delays in vulnerability assessment and remediation. This inefficiency hinders prompt responses to emerging threats and effective resource allocation based on true risk assessment. 

Justifying The Need for Centralized Visibility

To address these challenges, cybersecurity functions deserve a means to centralize their threat exposure visibility in one platform and one interface. This approach empowers them to not only respond promptly to threats but also proactively detect and mitigate potential attacks before they can escalate and cause substantial damage to the organization’s security and reputation. This centralized approach offers several compelling advantages:

Holistic View and Streamlined Operations: Centralizing threat exposure data provides a comprehensive, real-time view of your organization’s security posture. It allows you to normalize vulnerability risks, attach relevant threat intelligence, connect seemingly unrelated events, identify emerging threats, and assess the increase or reduction of risk associated with asset criticality. This streamlined approach enhances the efficiency of security teams, reducing dwell time and improving incident response.

Consolidated Data for Enhanced Decision-Making: Centralization enables the aggregation of data from various sources, including all security assessments and tests to network traffic, endpoint logs, cloud environments, and threat intelligence feeds. This unified dataset not only enhances the quality and context of threat detection but also provides security leaders with advanced analytics and reporting capabilities, enabling informed decision-making based on a deeper understanding of their threat landscape.

The Potential Outcomes and ROI

Centralizing threat exposure visibility doesn’t just solve operational challenges; it also delivers tangible benefits and a significant return on investment. Let’s explore some potential outcomes:

Proactive Threat Detection and Reduced Breach Likelihood: Improved visibility can result in detecting threats up to 10% earlier in their lifecycle, reducing the likelihood of successful breaches by as much as 40% and minimizing potential damage by millions of dollars.

Cost Savings and Improved Financial Resilience: Centralizing visibility can lead to a reduction in the number of cybersecurity tools required, resulting in cost savings of upwards of 20% associated with tool licenses, maintenance, and training. This streamlined investment approach not only cuts down on operational expenses but also enhances the efficiency and effectiveness of cybersecurity operations.

Enhanced Compliance and Resource Optimization: Centralized visibility simplifies compliance management, reducing compliance-related costs by 30% and minimizing the risk of penalties and fines, which can reach millions for non-compliance. Additionally, it allows for more efficient resource allocation, potentially saving up to 15% of the cybersecurity budget while maintaining or improving security posture.

Reduced Tool Overhead and Streamlined Investments: *It’s important to note that specific outcomes can vary depending on an organization’s size, existing infrastructure, and industry. These figures provide a general estimation of the potential benefits and can serve as a guideline for understanding the advantages of centralization in cybersecurity practices.

Conclusion

Centralizing your threat exposure visibility in one place is not just a solution to operational challenges; it is the path to a proactive and resilient cybersecurity strategy. The ‘scattered data dilemma’ presents significant hurdles, hindering both vulnerability management and incident response. To address these challenges effectively, we invite you to explore Hive Pro Uni5 Xposure as the solution. By centralizing threat exposure data, you empower your cybersecurity teams to detect threats earlier, reduce breach likelihood, and minimize potential damage. Moreover, you can achieve substantial cost savings, bolster financial resilience, enhance compliance, and optimize resource allocation.

These tangible benefits not only improve your organization’s security posture but also offer a significant return on investment. Don’t let the ‘scattered data dilemma’ hold you back; take the proactive step toward centralized visibility and fortified cybersecurity. Explore Hive Pro Uni5 Xposure today.

Author: Zaira Pirzada