Your attackers already have a map. Do you?

In the world of cybersecurity, knowledge is power. And in the continuous cat-and-mouse game between defenders and attackers, the side with the most accurate and comprehensive map often holds the winning hand. The uncomfortable truth for many organizations is this: your attackers may have a better map of your digital assets and vulnerabilities than you do.

Here’s how it goes:

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The attacker’s first move: Reconnaissance

Long before a sophisticated cyberattack unfolds, threat actors engage in extensive reconnaissance. This is a meticulous process. They’re not just looking for obvious cracks; they’re systematically mapping your entire external-facing digital footprint so that when they strike, there’s no guesswork involved.

An attacker’s “reconnaissance kit” includes tools to uncover:

• All Your Domains and Subdomains: From your main website to that forgotten microsite from a campaign five years ago, they’ll find them.
• Exposed IP Addresses and Cloud Assets: Every server, every cloud bucket, every instance that faces the internet is a potential entry point.
• Open Ports and Running Services: They’re scanning for services that are publicly accessible, even if they shouldn’t be.
• Outdated Software and Vulnerable Applications: They’re looking for the low-hanging fruit: known weaknesses in software versions or web applications.
• Employee Information: Leveraging public data to build phishing campaigns.

Attackers don’t wait for an invitation. They actively construct a detailed blueprint of your organization’s weaknesses, looking for the easiest path to breach your defenses. They are, in essence, drawing a map of your attack surface.

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The defender’s dilemma: Blind spots on the battlefield

Now, compare this to the typical defender’s situation. Security and IT teams are often overwhelmed, working from an internal perspective. They rely on:

• Internal Asset Inventories: Often outdated, incomplete, and rarely reflecting what’s actually exposed to the internet.
• Manual Processes: Trying to keep track of assets created, modified, or decommissioned in dynamic cloud environments is a losing battle.
• Limited Visibility: They might see what’s supposed to be there, but not necessarily what is there from an external, attacker-centric viewpoint.

This creates critical blind spots. You might have excellent defenses around your core, known assets, but what about the forgotten development server? The misconfigured cloud storage bucket? The old subdomain pointing to a vulnerable application? These are the unmapped territories on your security landscape – the places an attacker will inevitably find.

The truth is there are too many possibilities. You can’t defend territory you don’t know exists. And if your attackers have a more accurate map than you do, you’re at a serious disadvantage.

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Turn the tables: Gain the attacker’s perspective with Attack Surface Monitoring

Attack Surface Monitoring (ASM) shifts the power dynamic. Instead of reacting to what attackers find, or frantically updating spreadsheets for an audit, ASM empowers you to proactively discover and secure your entire external digital footprint.

Our Attack Surface Monitoring solution provides you with that crucial attacker’s map, but in your hands, it becomes a powerful defensive tool. It automates the reconnaissance process, continuously scanning and monitoring your internet-facing assets from an outside-in perspective.

Here’s how ASM gives you the strategic advantage:

• Comprehensive Discovery: Automatically finds all your internet-facing assets: known, unknown, and forgotten. This includes domains, subdomains, IP addresses, cloud resources, third-party services, and more.
• Continuous Visibility: Provides a real-time, dynamic view of your attack surface, ensuring you’re immediately aware of new exposures or changes.
• Vulnerability Identification: Pinpoints misconfigurations, open ports, outdated software, and other weaknesses that attackers actively seek out.
• Proactive Remediation: Equips your team with the intelligence needed to prioritize and fix vulnerabilities before they can be exploited.

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Stop playing catch-up

In the chess match of cybersecurity, being reactive is a losing strategy. By embracing an Attack Surface Monitoring approach, you stop waiting for auditors to point out your blind spots or for attackers to exploit them. You gain the upper hand by understanding your own external attack surface as thoroughly as a determined adversary would.

It’s time to stop fighting with an incomplete picture. Get your map and secure every inch of your digital perimeter.