What is a vulnerability scan? How does it differ from a Contact us? What are the benefits of a vulnerability scan? How often should you conduct a vulnerability scan? This article answers all these questions!
What is a vulnerability scan?
A vulnerability scan is essentially an automated process to identify potential security risks associated with your external perimeter or internal network. The market offers various vulnerability scanners, both free and paid. However, the key is to either know how to use the vulnerability scanner properly or to ensure your security vendor uses a trusted scanning solution.
At Lucid Security, we provide a vulnerability assessment as a service. Typically, the aim of a vulnerability assessment is to pinpoint potential security risks. These include vulnerable or outdated software versions, potentially risky ports/services exposed to the Internet, and sensitive files, among others. A reputable security vendor always provides a custom report with the vulnerability scan. Too often, security vendors may only provide standard HTML, PDF, or CSV outputs from a vulnerability scanner. This practice is not ideal because one should always manually verify the outputs from a vulnerability scanner. Results can be false positives, merely informational findings with no real security impact, or the criticality may be inadequately categorized. For this reason, Lucid Security always reviews the results of a vulnerability scan and ensures the report clearly articulates the vulnerabilities and remediation measures, and excludes any false positives.
Lastly, a vulnerability assessment stops at the identification phase of a vulnerability. Whereas a penetration test continues to the actual exploitation of a vulnerability.
Why should you have a vulnerability scan?
The reasons for conducting a vulnerability assessment can vary among organizations. A significant driver for many companies is compliance or customer requirements. It is common for organizations to undergo vulnerability assessments for compliance purposes or because they are doing business with a customer who demands a vulnerability scan and its results. Another reason is simply best practice to identify any potential issues on their external perimeter or internal network. Both are valid reasons.
How often should you conduct a vulnerability scan?
Lucid Security generally recommends conducting quarterly vulnerability scans at a minimum. With the ever-changing security landscape, new security vulnerabilities often emerge from security researchers or hackers. Thus, software you installed on a webserver that was just updated might develop a new vulnerability the following month. A vulnerability scan helps you stay ahead of issues before they escalate. It is also common to perform vulnerability scans monthly or bi-annually.
Conclusion
Lucid Security advises companies to perform quarterly vulnerability assessment, especially those with a larger than average attack surface. A reputable security vendor should provide the results of a vulnerability scan. Lucid Security always delivers custom reports that highlight the most relevant information on how to remediate and fix the issues.
How Lucid Security Can Help
Lucid Security employs expert security engineers with decades of combined experience in system administration, network administration, and security engineering. Our team delivers quality reports to ensure your organization remains secure. Contact us today to learn more about our vulnerability scan services.
