Exposure Management is Crucial to Reducing Cyber Risk

Cyber risk now tops the list of issues creating uncertainty and anxiety for businesses of every size.

When a single attack can have deep and lasting consequences for revenue, reputation, and regulatory compliance, detecting and responding to attacks isn’t enough. By that point, the damage is already done. 

In an effort to avoid the unpredictable fallout from a breach, cybersecurity strategies increasingly emphasize proactive measures aimed at preventing attacks before they happen. This is known as exposure management.

What is Exposure Management?

Exposure management, also called threat exposure management, is the process of:

1. Finding the vulnerabilities that attackers are likely to target
2. Prioritizing those vulnerabilities from highest to lowest risk 
3. Systematically remediating them, starting with the most urgent ones

By repeating this process continually, the number of exposures steadily goes down so attackers have fewer viable targets.’

Exposure management vs. attack surface management

Attack surface management (ASM) is a crucial part of exposure management that focuses on identifying issues with external-facing IT and preventing inbound attacks. What differentiates exposure management is that it has a broader scope as it also looks inward to locate and remediate weaknesses in internal tools and assets that could undermine security.

By taking a 360-degree view, exposure management offers a more proactive, holistic approach to cybersecurity that builds upon ASM. A 2023 Gartner analysis¹ confirms that the future of ASM lies in a more comprehensive exposure management approach.

Exposure management vs. vulnerability management

Vulnerability management is another important part of exposure management, but once again, it’s only a part of the equation. 

Vulnerabilities are flaws in code that make tools and systems easier to attack. They represent just one part of a company’s attack surface, while exposures constitute a much broader category. 

Exposures include vulnerabilities, but they also go beyond to include human errors, open ports, improperly configured security settings/controls, and other similar cyber risks. A comprehensive exposure management approach continually scans for and proactively resolves both vulnerabilities and exposures.

How Exposure Management Reduces Cyber Risk

In addition to strengthening cyber defenses, an exposure management strategy helps businesses prioritize their security efforts while lowering cyber risk. In fact, Gartner analysts predict that by 2026, businesses prioritizing security investments based on a continuous exposure management program will experience two-thirds fewer breaches than those that don’t.

Here’s what a comprehensive exposure management strategy can help with:

Prevent attacks before they happen

Because exposure management can prevent attackers from ever entering networks or reaching endpoints, the people, processes, and tools providing protection are under less pressure to identify and stop every attack.

Prioritize the greatest risks

Ranking exposures from highest to lowest risk helps businesses address the most important ones first to make the biggest reductions in cyber risk. For companies with limited security resources, especially small businesses, prioritizing security efforts where they will make the biggest impact helps to stretch those resources further.

Adapt to emerging threats

New cyber threats emerge constantly as attackers evolve their techniques. Simultaneously, new exposures emerge as IT evolves and businesses use an increasing number of digital apps and services. An exposure manager helps companies stay ahead of the ever-changing threat landscape by providing regular checks for exposures combined with diligent patch management.

Keep security costs in check

The phrase “an ounce of prevention equals a pound of cure” applies perfectly here. The amount of resources — time, money, headcount, tools, etc. — needed to manage exposures and prevent attacks pales in comparison to what response and recovery often consume. 

Meet regulatory requirements

Some companies are legally required to have exposure management in place due to industry regulations, compliance, or contractual requirements. As companies become increasingly accountable for their own cybersecurity (and how it impacts their end users), the importance of exposure management continues to grow.

Key Steps in Exposure Management

Exposure management is composed of systematic processes that work together to identify and assess risk among all of a business’s digital assets. The steps include:

1. Identification of Exposed Assets: Modern organizations, regardless of size, have a diverse tech stack. Digital assets may include web applications, APIs and endpoints, Internet of Things (IoT) devices, DNS records, and cloud-based resources like computing instances or storage. The initial step in exposure management involves identifying all these assets, which enables organizations to spot potential vulnerabilities and assess the assets at highest risk of exploitation.
2. Mapping the Attack Surface: Once an inventory of digital assets is complete, organizations should focus on understanding each asset’s susceptibility to exploitation. Mapping the attack surface allows organizations to adopt an adversary’s perspective and gain insights into how vulnerabilities could be exploited in different assets.
3. Risk Assessment: After mapping the attack surface, organizations need to assess the risks associated with each asset. Several factors contribute to an asset’s level of risk, including the sensitivity of the data it handles, the likelihood of exploitation, and the potential impact of an attack. Conducting a thorough risk assessment helps prioritize remediation efforts and allocate resources effectively.
4. Exposure Prioritization: Following the risk assessment, organizations can prioritize the remediation of exposures. This process entails establishing a clear understanding of which exposures require immediate attention and which can be addressed later. By prioritizing exposure risks, organizations can develop a focused and strategic approach to mitigate vulnerabilities efficiently.
5. Exposure Mitigation: Once exposures are prioritized, IT and security teams can proceed with remediation efforts to eliminate risks associated with exposed assets. This may involve actions like patching vulnerabilities, closing unnecessary ports, modifying access control policies, or even temporarily taking assets offline. Swift and targeted mitigation efforts significantly enhance overall security posture.
6. Continuous Monitoring: An organization’s attack surface is continuously evolving, with assets changing in terms of exposure and new security vulnerabilities being discovered. Therefore, exposure management relies heavily on continuous monitoring to detect new risks in real time and ensure that previously implemented mitigation actions remain effective. Ongoing monitoring helps organizations stay ahead of emerging threats and adapt their mitigation strategies accordingly.

The Proven ROI of Exposure Management

Because the cyber threat landscape is constantly evolving as businesses adopt new technologies and criminals develop new attack methods, continuous and proactive threat exposure management is a must-have today.

At-Bay’s research shows that exposure management as part of an insurance policy — including a full awareness of digital assets, regular scanning for emerging risks, quick and accurate identification of vulnerabilities, and proactive support to implement patches and solutions ASAP — can help SMBs manage cyber risk and reduce loss. One-time vulnerability scans and traditional insurance approaches that rely on exclusions and sublimits to manage catastrophic cyber risk simply won’t cut it anymore. 

Exposure management as part of a cyber insurance policy just makes sense. Modern businesses need cyber insurance that covers them in the event of a breach. If insurers can reduce the risk of the businesses they insure by helping those businesses improve their security over the course of the policy period, then they can reduce their own losses while reducing the need for businesses to invest in costly third-party security solutions. It’s a win-win.

Protection built into your At-Bay policy

At-Bay has reinvented cyber insurance so that we don’t just help businesses recover after an attack — we also help them maintain a strong security posture throughout the life of their policy in order to help stop attacks before they happen. In fact, At-Bay policyholders are 5X less likely than the industry average to experience a ransomware attack.²

At-Bay Stance™ Exposure Manager³ helps businesses easily manage cyber risk. All threat and vulnerability data is centralized in an easy-to-use online dashboard that you can access at any time to quickly and confidently see where you’re at risk. 

The dashboard ranks each exposure by threat level so that security teams can address the most urgent ones first. To expedite response and help businesses close exposures before hackers can exploit them, the Stance Exposure Manager dashboard includes detailed resolution instructions for each exposure. 

Go to at-bay.com/security to learn more about how an At-Bay insurance policy can help make your business safer.

Footnotes

1. Source: Gartner, “Emerging Tech: Security — The Future of Attack Surface Management Supports Exposure Management,” 2023

2. Frequency based on Primary and Excess Cyber and Tech Errors & Omissions losses reported and exposure earned through 9/30/2022, evaluated as of 10/1/2022, and 2020-2021 industry analysis.

3. At-Bay Stance Exposure Manager is only available to At-Bay policyholders who have purchased Embedded Security, as shown in policy declarations. Please refer to your policy.