9.How can I identify cyber threats for my organization?
There are some best practices your organization can employ to help you better identify cyber threats.
First, you need insight into what today's threat landscape looks like. While many organizations try to do this by keeping their security teams involved in industry news and research, you may find it more effective to partner with a resource such as Tenable Research. Your teams are already busy seeking out weaknesses and trying to remediate them. It's almost impossible for a small team or an already busy team to identify all of today's biggest threats. Instead of using your team's time and resources for that big-picture research, a team like Tenable can help ensure it's delivered to you, right within your Tenable product of choice. That way, you can focus your team's attention on figuring out which of those important vulnerabilities are applicable to your environment and how to prioritize which ones to address first.
And, it's not just about threats within your organization. Cyber threats are always evolving externally as well, so you'll need a good read on what those are so you know where to focus your attention.
Next, once you're familiar with what the threat landscape looks like, you need visibility across your entire environment and through all of your assets. Remember, it's no longer just about IT assets on site. Your teams likely have a gamut of mobile devices to monitor, as well as software-as-a-service applications, and other cloud-based solutions.
Visibility into all of your assets supported by an accurate (and automatically updated) asset inventory is key. Without knowing which assets you have, as well as when and how they are used, you can't identify where you have weaknesses. Asset inventory, as well as identification of critical services and operations, is a key early step in identifying cyber threats for your organization.
Once you know where all of your assets are and how they're being used, you'll need help identifying all of your potential vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, unpatched systems and other security issues. Consider using a tool that automates vulnerability identification for you, such as Tenable Nessus.
Nessus Network Monitor, for example, gives you continuous insight into vulnerabilities in your environment. And, unlike having your team go out and try to discover all potential security issues manually, you'll have access through Nessus to 78,000 CVEs, more than 174,000 plugins, with 100 or more new plugins added weekly.
Tenable One, for example, is an exposure management platform that will help you determine not just where you have those cyber threats, but the risk they pose to your organization. It's a way to know your cyber risk at any time, no matter how or when your environment changes.
With a tool like Tenable One you can also easily prioritize which of these cyber threats you should focus on first. Tenable's Vulnerability Priority Rating (VPR) gives you an easy-to-understand score so you know what to focus on first.
So, now that you've identified where you have vulnerabilities and prioritized which ones your team should address first, it's time to put your response actions into play. While playbooks, policies and procedures are critical here, a tool like Tenable can help automate your response based on your preset parameters or industry recognized best practices. A platform like Tenable One can help you quickly alert and notify key team members based on their roles and responsibilities, again, helping you stay ahead of attackers before they have a chance to exploit a weakness you didn't know was there.